Blockchain Papers

Carlos Cardoso, Caio Silva, Alan Veloso, Jeffson Sousa · 5 authors

As Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs) mature into production-grade systems, a critical gap emerges between protocol-level benchmarking and application-centric performance testing. While specialized tools like Hyperledger Caliper excel at measuring core on-chain metrics, they are less suited for evaluating the end-to-end performance of applications that interact with the DLT through an intermediary API layer. This paper addresses this gap by proposing a three-tier, API-driven framework that enables mature, general-purpose load testing tools, such as Apache JMeter, to realistically assess a Hyperledger Besu network’s performance from an application’s perspective. The core of our solution is a custom API server that provides essential services like atomic nonce management and dynamic load balancing. Our comparative analysis demonstrates that while Caliper may report higher end-to-end throughput under specific conditions, our framework induces a significantly more substantial and evenly distributed load, revealing a more accurate picture of the network’s true processing capacity. Furthermore, our approach captures API-layer latency—a crucial metric for client-perceived responsiveness—which proved to be an order of magnitude lower than the on-chain finality measured by Caliper. This work validates a reusable architectural pattern for testing DLTs within a realistic application stack, bridging the gap between protocol benchmarking and real-world performance engineering.

Hooda, Shakti

This dissertation analyzes how the European Union (EU) is able to regulate crypto-assets with the proposed Regulation on Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA). Crypto-assets havebeen regarded as one of the most disruptive advancements in finance and have beenableto operate without the use of traditional intermediaries and are able to challenge thecurrent regulatory frameworks. Besides the opportunities these crypto-assets bring for thefinancial sector, there is also the concern of financial stability, consumer protection, andintegrity of the market. These aspects also need to be considered with the use of innovative technologies. The approach to this research is both doctrinal as well as comparative. The research first describes the foundational concepts and technologies of crypto-assets and decentralizedfinance (DeFi) along with stablecoins and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Afterwards theMiCA proposal is described in a certain detail. This is particularly in relation totheoverall EU financial regulation and its fulfillment to custody, disclosure, governance andlicensing aspects. To assess the extent of which MiCA is adequate, this dissertation reviews the pragmatics of the EU miCA with that of other major jurisdictions, like the US, the UK, andtheframeworks constructed by global organizations like the Financial Stability Board or theFinancial Action Task Force. Such a comparative analysis underscores a lack of a unifiedlegal framework especially with respect to DeFi, NFTs, and cross-border jurisdictional issues. The dissertation finds that MiCA is an integral building block towards the convergence of crypto-asset legislation in the EU. It decreases the confusion and discordant regulatorylandscape. However, it also maintains that MiCA is overlooking important elements likethe control of decentralized systems and the enforcement of anti-money launderinglegislation. Enhanced international collaboration and regulatory amendments will benecessary in order to foster the innovative frameworks that will ensure the stability of the financial systems.

Jaibir Singh, Salil Bharany, Suman Rani, Ateeq Ur Rehman · 7 authors

The convergence of blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), and cloud computing is catalyzing a paradigm shift in developing secure, intelligent, and scalable digital infrastructures. This triad of technologies is increasingly utilized to improve performance, transparency, and trust in engineering-driven and socio-technical environments. This study systematically reviews the evolution, integration strategies, and applications of blockchain, AI, and cloud computing in digital ecosystems. The analysis is based on 108 peer-reviewed studies spanning the years 2012 to 2025. A comprehensive literature analysis was conducted to identify trends, synergies, and sector-specific implementations of these systems. The review explores how their integration supports real-world engineering and operational use cases. Blockchain contributes to decentralized architectures, secure data exchange, and identity verification. AI supports adaptive behavior, autonomous decision-making, and predictive analytics. Cloud computing offers the scalable infrastructure necessary for deployment. Key challenges addressed include interoperability, latency, security trade-offs, and resource allocation. Use cases in digital finance, supply chain management, and industrial automation demonstrate the effectiveness of this integration in building resilient, ethically aligned, and high-performance infrastructures. The findings offer valuable insights and technical considerations for engineers and architects seeking to design next-generation cyber-physical systems that are secure, intelligent, and socially responsive. Clinical Trial Number Not applicable.

Khalid Al‐Khatib, Fares Ayoub, Qais Marji

No abstract is available for this record.

Liviu Ionut Epure

This project presents QoreChain, a novel Layer 1 blockchain architecture that addresses two critical challenges facing distributed ledger technology: vulnerability to quantum computing attacks and inefficient network resource allocation. As cryptographically relevant quantum computers are projected to emerge within 5-10 years, current blockchain infrastructures relying on elliptic curve cryptography face existential security threats. Simultaneously, existing networks struggle with scalability, cross-chain interoperability, and intelligent resource optimization. QoreChain introduces a quantum-native security architecture implementing ML-KEM (Kyber-1024) for post-quantum key exchange with migration pathways to Dilithium and Falcon signatures. Our hybrid classical-PQC bridge protocol enables seamless cryptographic migration without network disruption while maintaining backward compatibility—a capability absent in current blockchain platforms. Beyond quantum resistance, QoreChain integrates artificial intelligence at the protocol level through an Adaptive Intelligence Layer that performs dynamic transaction routing, predictive resource allocation, and cognitive consensus optimization, achieving demonstrable performance improvements: 5,914+ transactions per second with sub-second finality, 40% reduction in finality times during peak loads, and 60% reduction in cross-chain swap slippage through AI-driven liquidity positioning. The architecture comprises three synergistic innovations: (1) a multi-layer scalability framework with AI-driven chain selection routing transactions across main chain, sidechains, and paychains based on value and computational requirements; (2) the QoreChain Consensus Algorithm (QCA) extending Combined Proof of Stake with reputation-weighted validator selection and temporal consensus layering enabling parallel consensus sessions across different time horizons; and (3) comprehensive developer tooling including natural language smart contract generation with cross-chain compilation, automated vulnerability detection using predictive AI, and voice-first accessibility features. We demonstrate QoreChain's practical applicability through integration specifications for enterprise environments (financial services, defense, healthcare), IoT deployments with hardware-optimized lightweight cryptography for resource-constrained devices, and universal cross-chain connectivity supporting Ethereum, Solana, TON, BSC, Avalanche, and Cosmos ecosystems via IBC, LayerZero, and proprietary protocols. Performance benchmarks, security proofs, and economic sustainability models validate QoreChain's viability as future-proof blockchain infrastructure for the post-quantum era.Abstract content goes here

Davronbek Abdugaffarov

This article addresses the complex issues of choosing legal principles in international commercial contracts in the context of globalization and the rapid development of digital commerce. It analyzes the fundamental principle of party autonomy, in particular its explicit (expressly stated in the contract) and implied (determined based on the circumstances) forms. The paper considers the adaptation of traditional legal approaches to modern challenges such as smart contracts, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) and jurisdictional uncertainty. The immutability of smart contracts, while providing commercial certainty, simultaneously gives rise to legal paradoxes and regulatory gaps, as demonstrated in the case of Van Loon v. US Treasury. The need to obtain legal entity status for DAOs creates a market of “legal shells” offered by various jurisdictions (e.g., Wyoming, Switzerland). The emergence of innovative mechanisms such as multi-signature arbitration in dispute resolution leads to the privatization of enforcement proceedings. The aim of the study is to examine the adaptation of traditional legal approaches to modern challenges such as smart contracts, decentralized autonomous organizations, and jurisdictional uncertainty. The paper uses legal analysis and case study methods. The results show that the immutability of smart contracts creates legal paradoxes, while mandatory public law rules limit the voluntary autonomy of the parties.

Stefanos Leonardos, Daniël Reijsbergen, Barnabé Monnot, Georgios Piliouras

Transaction fee mechanisms are pivotal elements of blockchain economies, as they resolve the inherent scarcity in the number of transactions that can be added to each block. First-price auction mechanisms implemented by early blockchain protocols, however, contributed to pronounced intra-block disparities, unpredictable waiting times, high congestion, and other inefficiencies. To mitigate these effects, alternative fee market mechanism has been proposed, e.g., Ethereum’s EIP-1559. In this article, we investigate the ramifications of EIP-1559 on system performance and user experience. Although we prove that EIP-1559 exhibits chaotic behavior even under optimal conditions, we demonstrate that the influence of this chaotic behavior on the primary design objective of the fee mechanism—blocks whose long-term average size equals the target—is limited. Our theoretical bound shows that block sizes in the EIP-1559 mechanism are lower bounded by target utilization—half-full blocks—and the upper bound is capped at 6% beyond the target. These findings are confirmed by an empirical evaluation that shows that the average discrepancy has been 2.9% under Proof-of-Work and decreases to around 1% or less following Ethereum’s transition to Proof-of-Stake. However, the chaotic oscillations in block sizes and the slow adjustments during periods of demand bursts (e.g., NFT drops) result in undesirable inter-block variations in mining rewards and compromise the overall user experience. To address these issues, we propose an alternative base fee adjustment rule, characterized by a learning rate that adapts according to an additive increase, multiplicative decrease (AIMD) update scheme. Our data-driven simulations show that the latter robustly outperforms the EIP-1559 protocol across various demand scenarios.

Harsha Kumar A, Preetham Venkatram C, N. Saran, David Daniel · 5 authors

Traditional Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems suffer from critical vulnerabilities in security, interoperability, and patient data control. This paper introduces PolyMed, a novel decentralized platform designed to address these challenges. PolyMed combines blockchain, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and edge computing into a synergistic architecture. It uses the Polygon blockchain for immutable record-keeping and a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) for transparent governance. Patient identity is secured through privacy-preserving zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) and anchored to non-transferable Soulbound Tokens (SBTs), granting users true sovereignty over their data. The platform also includes a Decentralized Finance (DeFi) module to improve healthcare accessibility. Empirical evaluations on the Polygon Mainnet confirm the system's viability, showing sub-4-second transaction latencies and over 90% cost savings compared to legacy systems. The integrated AI model, leveraging a LightGBM classifier on a rich set of engineered features, achieves an Area Under the Curve (AUC) of 0.8543 and an accuracy of 80.33% in emergency detection, demonstrating high reliability on a clinically relevant and imbalanced dataset. By aligning with global standards like General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), PolyMed offers an integrated platform for patient-centric digital health management.

Maxim Jourenko, Mario Larangeira, Kanta Kurazumi, Keisuke Tanaka

Abstract Blockchain-based systems, in particular cryptocurrencies, face a serious limitation: scalability. This holds, especially, in terms of the number of transactions per second. Several alternatives are currently being pursued by both the research and practitioner communities. One venue for exploration is on protocols that do not constantly add transactions on the blockchain and therefore do not consume the blockchain’s resources. This is done using off-chain transactions, i.e. , protocols that minimize the interaction with the blockchain, also commonly known as Layer-2 approaches. This work relates several existing off-chain channel methods, also known as payment and state channels, channel network construction methods, and other components such as channel and network management protocols, e.g. , routing nodes. All these components are crucial to keep the usability of the channel and are often overlooked. In this work, we propose a taxonomy for all the components of Layer-2. We provide extensive coverage of the state-of-the-art protocols available outline their respective approaches, and discuss their advantages and disadvantages.

Kaveri Banerjee, Sajal Saha

Blockchain systems rely on decentralized ledgers and strong security guarantees. A key requirement is non-repudiation, which prevents denial of transaction authorship and supports integrity of recorded data. This work surveys digital signature schemes used in blockchain platforms and analyzes how they deliver non-repudiation and contribute to overall system security. We examine representative scheme families and their cryptographic foundations, security assumptions, and properties relevant to deployment, including unforgeability, resistance to malleability, support for aggregation and multisignature or threshold settings, key and signature sizes, and verification cost. Using these criteria, we compare the suitability of different designs for consensus protocols, smart contract constraints, and resource limits. We highlight practical tradeoffs that affect throughput, storage, scalability, and attack surfaces, and summarize benefits and limitations of each scheme in blockchain contexts. The study underscores that carefully chosen digital signatures are central to achieving non-repudiation and preserving information integrity, and it outlines implementation considerations and open directions such as interoperability and post-quantum readiness.

Jotaro Yano

We formalize a cross-domain "ZK coprocessor bridge" that lets Solana programs request private execution on Aztec L2 (via Ethereum) using Wormhole Verifiable Action Approvals (VAAs) as authenticated transport. The system comprises: (i) a Solana program that posts messages to Wormhole Core with explicit finality; (ii) an EVM Portal that verifies VAAs, enforces a replay lock, parses a bound payload secretHash||m from the attested VAA, derives a domain-separated field commitment, and enqueues an L1->L2 message into the Aztec Inbox (our reference implementation v0.1.0 currently uses consumeWithSecret(vaa, secretHash); we provide migration guidance to the payload-bound interface); (iii) a minimal Aztec contract that consumes the message privately; and (iv) an off-chain relayer that ferries VAAs and can record receipts on Solana. We present state machines, message formats, and proof sketches for replay-safety, origin authenticity, finality alignment, parameter binding (no relayer front-running of Aztec parameters), privacy, idempotence, and liveness. Finally, we include a concise Reproducibility note with pinned versions and artifacts to replicate a public testnet run.

Boya Zhang

The evolution of the technical architecture of digital currencies is profoundly reshaping the global monetary system. This article starts from the core dimensions of technical architecture selection, systematically analyzes the technical characteristics and applicable scenarios of blockchain, distributed ledgers, and hybrid architectures, and combines the two-tier operation system design of central bank digital currencies (CBDC) to explore their sustainable development paths in areas such as payment efficiency, privacy protection, and regulatory compliance. Research shows that the modular reconfiguration of the technical architecture, the improvement of cross-chain interoperability, and the application of quantum-secure encryption technology are the keys to promoting the realization of "controllable anonymity" and global deployment of CBDCS. This article puts forward policy suggestions such as driving technological iteration through a regulatory sandbox mechanism and building a multilateral central bank digital currency bridge, providing theoretical support for the maintenance of monetary sovereignty and the upgrading of financial infrastructure in the digital currency era.

A. I. Tsymbaliuk

This article offers a comprehensive analysis of the current state of legal regulation of blockchain technology and smart contracts in Ukraine and examines their underlying legal nature. Written against the backdrop of global innovations and practical applications of distributed-ledger technology, the study addresses the urgent need to harmonise Ukraine’s regulatory framework with that of the European Union. Adopting an interdisciplinary perspective, the author integrates legal, economic, and technological considerations, viewing blockchain not merely as an innovative IT infrastructure but also as a socio- legal phenomenon capable of transforming tax, registration, and corporate processes. The introduction substantiates the relevance of the research: the rapid expansion of the digital economy, the widespread adoption of virtual assets, and the imperative to reduce corruption risks in the public sector all necessitate legislative adaptation and the introduction of new legal concepts. The purpose of the article is to develop a national regulatory model that reconciles technological innovation with the principles of transparency, legal certainty, and protection of market participants’ rights. The core of the study focuses on five potential areas for deploying blockchain in public administration: electronic tax reporting, accounting for electronic invoices, automated tax payments via smart contracts, an open register of taxpayers, and real-time monitoring of goods flows. The author demonstrates that implementing these solutions can reduce operational costs for businesses, significantly decrease errors and fraud, and enhance public trust in state institutions. Special attention is given to the legal status of NFTs and other tokenised assets. Based on an analysis of Ukrainian and international legislation, the article argues that the transfer of economic copyrights via NFTs requires a written (including electronic) agreement bearing a qualified electronic signature, clearly defined licensing terms, and integration with official state registers to verify legal title.

Devendra L. Bhuyar

The integration of Industrial Automation Systems (IAS) with the Internet of Things (IoT) under Industry 4.0 has significantly enhanced operational efficiency but also exposed critical communication infrastructures to cyber threats. Conventional security frameworks often fail to ensure end-to-end data integrity, authentication, and confidentiality in real-time industrial networks. This paper proposes a blockchain-enabled mathematical cryptography model designed to secure data transmission between industrial nodes. The framework utilizes Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) for lightweight key generation, SHA-3 hashing for immutable transaction records, and smart contract-based consensus for autonomous trust management within a distributed ledger. A simulated industrial environment demonstrates that the proposed model achieves 42% faster encryption-decryption cycles and a 38% reduction in data latency compared to traditional asymmetric cryptosystems. The mathematical foundation ensures provable security under discrete logarithm assumptions, while blockchain consensus guarantees tamper resistance and auditability. This study contributes a scalable, mathematically robust architecture for secure data transmission in automation networks, offering potential integration within Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) and Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) environments.

Siyue Wang

This paper studies how luxury brands act in the metaverse. It utilizes a literature review and two semi-structured expert interviews. It details three stages of digital adoption: resistance, selective integration, and Web3 experiments. It explains how NFTs, virtual goods, and token-gated access create technical scarcity and visible status. It shows how young consumers use digital items to build identity and community. It also lists key risks: energy use, data privacy, and brand dilution. The findings outline key digital tools that help maintain core luxury values and point to unanswered questions about long-term brand equity and consumer behavior.

I Made Ardita, Ni Made Suci, Fridayana Yudiaatmaja

Penelitian ini dilatarbelakangi oleh dinamika harga Bitcoin yang dipengaruhi oleh tiga peristiwa utama, yaitu halving, persetujuan Exchange-Traded Fund (ETF) Bitcoin, dan adopsi institusional. Ketiga faktor tersebut dianggap membentuk mekanisme penawaran permintaan serta memengaruhi stabilitas pasar aset digital. Penelitian ini bertujuan menganalisis pengaruh halving, ETF Bitcoin, dan adopsi institusional terhadap tren harga Bitcoin. Jenis penelitian yang digunakan adalah deskriptif kuantitatif, dengan subjek berupa data historis harga Bitcoin, termasuk periode halving, peristiwa ETF, dan momen adopsi institusional. Data dikumpulkan melalui dokumentasi, studi pustaka, dan pemanfaatan data sekunder dari platform keuangan dan laporan institusi. Instrumen penelitian berupa data log return harian yang kemudian diuji melalui serangkaian uji asumsi klasik (normalitas, homoskedastisitas, heteroskedastisitas). Analisis data menggunakan Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) dan uji pengaruh parsial simultan. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa halving berpengaruh signifikan terhadap perubahan harga Bitcoin, mencerminkan efek kelangkaan pasokan. Sebaliknya, adopsi institusional dan ETF Bitcoin tidak menunjukkan pengaruh signifikan secara statistik, namun tetap memberikan kontribusi struktural dalam meningkatkan stabilitas dan legitimasi pasar. Secara simultan, ketiga faktor tersebut membentuk pola yang saling melengkapi dalam memengaruhi dinamika harga Bitcoin. Penelitian ini menyimpulkan bahwa analisis siklus halving, tren adopsi institusional, dan perkembangan ETF penting digunakan sebagai dasar pengambilan keputusan investasi serta penyusunan kebijakan yang mendukung ekosistem aset digital yang berkelanjutan.

Asad Mujeeb, Jamiu O. Oladigbolu, Mutiu Shola Bakare, Abduljelil Atima Ibrahim

As the global push for carbon neutrality accelerates, energy efficiency has become essential for sustainable development, especially for nations like Nigeria that face rising energy demands and significant environmental challenges. This study explores how integrating energy efficiency with carbon neutrality can support Nigeria's strategic energy goals while offering global lessons for other countries facing similar challenges, focusing on key sectors, including industry, transport, and power generation. The study systematically examines the impacts of renewable energy (RE) technologies, like solar, wind, and hydropower—alongside policy reforms, technological innovations, and demand-side management strategies to advance energy efficiency in Nigeria. Key findings include the identification of strategic policy frameworks, technological solutions, and the transformative role of green hydrogen in decarbonizing hard-to-electrify sectors. The study also emphasizes the importance of international climate finance, decentralized RE systems like solar mini-grids for improving energy access, and economic opportunities for job creation in the RE sector. Furthermore, it highlights the need for behavioral changes, community engagement, and consistent policy implementation to address infrastructure gaps and drive energy efficiency goals. The novelty of this research lies in its scenario-based analysis of Nigeria's low-carbon transition, detailing both the opportunities and challenges, such as policy inconsistencies, infrastructure deficits, and financial constraints. The findings stress the importance of international collaboration, technological advancements, and targeted investments to overcome these challenges. By offering actionable insights and strategic recommendations, this study provides a roadmap for policymakers, industry stakeholders, and researchers to drive Nigeria towards a sustainable, carbon-neutral future by 2050.

Vladislav Virtonen

The third Bitcoin halving that took place in May 2020 cut down the mining reward from 12.5 to 6.25 BTC per block and thus slowed down the rate of issuance of new Bitcoins, making it more scarce. The fourth and most recent halving happened in April 2024, cutting the block reward further to 3.125 BTC. If the demand did not decrease simultaneously after these halvings, then the neoclassical economic theory posits that the price of Bitcoin should have increased due to the halving. But did it, in fact, increase for that reason, or is this a post hoc fallacy? This paper uses synthetic control to construct a weighted Bitcoin that is different from its counterpart in one aspect - it did not undergo halving. Comparing the price trajectory of the actual and the simulated Bitcoins, I find evidence of a positive effect of the 2024 Bitcoin halving on its price three months later. The magnitude of this effect is one fifth of the total percentage change in the price of Bitcoin during the study period - from April 2, 2023, to July 21, 2024 (17 months). The second part of the study fails to obtain a statistically significant and robust causal estimate of the effect of the 2020 Bitcoin halving on Bitcoin's price. This is the first paper analyzing the effect of halving causally, building on the existing body of correlational research.

Bhabendu Kumar Mohanta, Ali Ismail Awad, Tarek Elsaka, Hamza Kheddar · 5 authors

Intelligent devices with embedded technology have proliferated dramatically over the past decade. The Internet of Things (IoT) has emerged as a transformational force, advancing traditional systems to previously unattainable levels of intelligence. Smart cities, transportation, healthcare, supply-chain management, agriculture, water management, and smart grid (SG) systems are among the industries where the IoT has found applications. These developments are demonstrated by the integration of IoT systems into SG networks, offering significant improvements in sustainability, dependability, and efficiency. Such systems use various IoT devices to continuously monitor the environment and transmit data for processing and analysis. Nonetheless, the growth of the IoT has introduced security vulnerabilities, including concerns about user identification, data integrity, and trust, especially in SG applications. This study aims to resolve several security challenges in IoT-enabled SG applications to support sustainability. The proposed scheme effectively tackles critical security requirements such as data integrity, user anonymity, distributed storage, trust management, and decentralized architecture. The security concerns addressed by blockchain technology include preserving data integrity, fostering trust, providing secure communication, and enabling effective monitoring. Smart contracts automate system processes and are effective in maintaining user trust. The experimental findings support the viability of the proposed system, demonstrating a computational cost of 3.150 ms and a communication overhead of 992 bits, both representing improvements over various existing solutions. Additionally, the deployment cost for the smart contract is found to be 5.64 USD with a writing cost of 2.89 USD, both of which are lower than the costs associated with comparable approaches.

Rabia Arshad, Muhammad Milhan Afzal Khan, Saman Rasheed, Irtaza Ijaz · 5 authors

Blockchain technology has transformed decentralized data exchange and digital payments but the consistently high gas prices pose a significant challenge to its scalability and efficiency. This research explores the role of AI-driven gas price prediction and data compression methods on gas utilization in blockchain systems with special emphasis on Ethereum transactions. Using actual Ethereum transaction history, we compare the performance of compressed versus uncompressed payloads with three different compression algorithms: Zlib, Brotli, and Gzip. Beyond that, a linear regression model is also trained to forecast hourly gas Price fluctuations given past transaction history. The methodology includes thorough statistical analysis to provide accurate and reproducible results. Our results show that compressing text data over 141 bytes using the Zlib algorithm prior to making transactions on the Ethereum network decreases the amount of gas Used without altering system time. This validates the efficiency of combining data compression with gas price forecasting in minimizing transaction costs without affecting performance. Moreover, our study further encompasses investigation of actual gas Price trends and provides real-world insights for optimizing timing strategies for economic transaction execution. These results enhance the knowledge of Ethereum gas dynamics and provide valuable solutions for enhancing economic efficiency and resource utilization in applications based on blockchain. Future efforts will involve applying the framework to the Ethereum mainnet, using deep learning models for increased prediction accuracy, and adaptive compression dependent on network state and transaction size.

Saurabh Garg

Today's organizations increasingly utilize autonomous agents to make key operational decisions withinsupply chains, financial transactions, healthcare networks, and risk management areas. Yet, these smart agents are constrained

Mitchell Marfinetz

CoW Protocol batch auctions aggregate user intents and rely on solvers to find optimal execution paths that maximize user surplus across heterogeneous automated market makers (AMMs) under stringent auction deadlines. Deterministic single-objective heuristics that optimize only expected output frequently fail to exploit split-flow opportunities across multiple parallel paths and to internalize gas, slippage, and execution risk constraints in a unified search. We apply evolutionary multi-objective optimization to this blockchain routing problem, proposing a hybrid genetic algorithm (GA) architecture for real-time solver optimization that combines a production-grade, multi-objective NSGA-II engine with adaptive instance profiling and deterministic baselines. Our core engine encodes variable-length path sets with continuous split ratios and evolves candidate route-and-volume allocations under a Pareto objective vector F = (user surplus, -gas, -slippage, -risk), enabling principled trade-offs and anytime operation within the auction deadline. An adaptive controller selects between GA and a deterministic dual-decomposition optimizer with Bellman-Ford based negative-cycle detection, with a guarantee to never underperform the baseline. The open-source system integrates six protection layers and passes 8/8 tests, validating safety and correctness. In a 14-stratum benchmark (30 seeds each), the hybrid approach yields absolute user-surplus gains of approximately 0.40-9.82 ETH on small-to-medium orders, while large high-fragmentation orders are unprofitable across gas regimes. Convergence occurs in about 0.5 s median (soft capped at 1.0 s) within a 2-second limit. We are not aware of an openly documented multi-objective GA with end-to-end safety for real-time DEX routing.

Davide Mancino, Hasret Ozan Sevim, Oriol Saguillo Gonzalez

This student paper introduces a novel methodology for the detection and analysis of multihop cross-chain arbitrage opportunities, wherein multihop denotes arbitrage sequences involving more than two transactional steps across distinct blockchain networks, executed using sequence-dependent strategies. Utilizing a comprehensive dataset comprising over 2.4 billion transactions recorded between September 2023 and August 2024 (encompassing 12 blockchain platforms and 45 cross-chain bridges) we design and implement an algorithm capable of identifying, sequence-dependent arbitrage paths spanning multiple ecosystems. Our empirical analysis demonstrates that such arbitrage opportunities are exceedingly infrequent, underscoring the inherent challenges associated with multihop execution in cross-chain environments.

Mojtaba Eshghie, Gabriele Morello, Matteo Lauretano, Alexandre Bartel · 5 authors

Smart contract vulnerabilities cost billions of dollars annually, yet existing automated analysis tools fail to generate deployable defenses. We present FLAMES, a novel automated approach that synthesizes executable runtime guards as Solidity "require" statements to harden smart contracts against exploits. Unlike prior work that relies on vulnerability labels, symbolic analysis, or natural language specifications, FLAMES employs domain-adapted large language models trained through fill-in-the-middle supervised fine-tuning on real-world invariants extracted from 514,506 verified contracts. Our extensive evaluation across three dimensions demonstrates FLAMES's effectiveness: (1) Compilation: FLAMES achieves 96.7% compilability for synthesized invariant (2) Semantic Quality: on a curated test set of 5,000 challenging invariants, FLAMES produces exact or semantically equivalent matches to ground truth in 44.5% of cases; (3) Exploit Mitigation: FLAMES prevents 22 out of 108 real exploits (20.4%) while preserving contract functionality, and (4) FLAMES successfully blocks the real-world APEMAGA incident by synthesizing a pre-condition that mitigates the attack. FLAMES establishes that domain-adapted LLMs can automatically generate production-ready security defenses for smart contracts without requiring vulnerability detection, formal specifications, or human intervention. We release our code, model weights, datasets, and evaluation infrastructure to enable reproducible research in this critical domain.