  Let $\mathbf{f}=(f\_1,\ldots,f\_m)$ and $\mathbf{g}=(g\_1,\ldots,g\_m)$ be
two sets of $m\geq 1$ nonlinear polynomials over $\mathbb{K}[x\_1,\ldots,x\_n]$
($\mathbb{K}$ being a field). We consider the computational problem of finding
-- if any -- an invertible transformation on the variables mapping $\mathbf{f}$
to $\mathbf{g}$. The corresponding equivalence problem is known as {\tt
Isomorphism of Polynomials with one Secret} ({\tt IP1S}) and is a fundamental
problem in multivariate cryptography. The main result is a randomized
polynomial-time algorithm for solving {\tt IP1S} for quadratic instances, a
particular case of importance in cryptography and somewhat justifying {\it a
posteriori} the fact that {\it Graph Isomorphism} reduces to only cubic
instances of {\tt IP1S} (Agrawal and Saxena). To this end, we show that {\tt
IP1S} for quadratic polynomials can be reduced to a variant of the classical
module isomorphism problem in representation theory, which involves to test the
orthogonal simultaneous conjugacy of symmetric matrices. We show that we can
essentially {\it linearize} the problem by reducing quadratic-{\tt IP1S} to
test the orthogonal simultaneous similarity of symmetric matrices; this latter
problem was shown by Chistov, Ivanyos and Karpinski to be equivalent to finding
an invertible matrix in the linear space $\mathbb{K}^{n \times n}$ of $n \times
n$ matrices over $\mathbb{K}$ and to compute the square root in a matrix
algebra. While computing square roots of matrices can be done efficiently using
numerical methods, it seems difficult to control the bit complexity of such
methods. However, we present exact and polynomial-time algorithms for computing
the square root in $\mathbb{K}^{n \times n}$ for various fields (including
finite fields). We then consider \\#{\tt IP1S}, the counting version of {\tt
IP1S} for quadratic instances. In particular, we provide a (complete)
characterization of the automorphism group of homogeneous quadratic
polynomials. Finally, we also consider the more general {\it Isomorphism of
Polynomials} ({\tt IP}) problem where we allow an invertible linear
transformation on the variables \emph{and} on the set of polynomials. A
randomized polynomial-time algorithm for solving {\tt IP} when
\(\mathbf{f}=(x\_1^d,\ldots,x\_n^d)\) is presented. From an algorithmic point
of view, the problem boils down to factoring the determinant of a linear matrix
(\emph{i.e.}\ a matrix whose components are linear polynomials). This extends
to {\tt IP} a result of Kayal obtained for {\tt PolyProj}.
