vDLT: A Service-Oriented Blockchain System with Virtualization and Decoupled Management/Control and Execution

Abstract

A wide range of services and applications can be improved and/or solved by\nusing distributed ledger technology (DLT). These services and applications have\nwidely varying quality of service (QoS) requirements. However, most existing\nDLT systems do not distinguish different QoS requirements, resulting in\nsignificant performance issues such as poor scalability and high cost. In this\nwork, we present vDLT -- a service-oriented blockchain system with\nvirtualization and decoupled management/control and execution. In vDLT,\nservices and applications are classified into different classes according to\ntheir QoS requirements, including confirmation latency, throughput, cost,\nsecurity, privacy, etc. This is a paradigm shift from the existing\n"blockchain-oriented" DLT systems to next generation "service-oriented" DLT\nsystems. Different QoS requirements are fulfilled by advanced schemes inspired\nby the development of the traditional Internet, including classification,\nqueuing, virtualization, resource allocation and orchestration, and\nhierarchical architecture. In addition, management/control and execution of\nsmart contracts are decoupled to support QoS provisioning, improve\ndecentralization, and facilitate evolution in vDLT. With virtualization,\ndifferent virtual DLT systems with widely varying characteristics can be\ndynamically created and operated to accommodate different services and\napplications.\n