What if ....
Someone was a bit nonchalant and did not back up his/her coins, but ... But he/she remembers his/her private key. Is there a way to 'restore' these 'lost' coins? IOW, is there a way to match private key and a specific address in the block-chain?
As I understand it:
The Bitcoin address is a sha-256 hash of the public key.
The "private key" isn't really a private key but more a public/private keypair.
Yes you can easily extract a public key and bitcoin address from a private key.
Go to
www.bitaddress.org and fill in a private key under the tab wallet details... it will give you the address.