Follow blockchain research across journals, conferences, and preprint repositories.
2,085 results · page 66 of 87
Haibo Tian, Huizhi Lin, Fangguo Zhang
No abstract is available for this record.
Ch. V. N. U. Bharathi Murthy, M. Lawanya Shri, Seifedine Kadry, Sangsoon Lim
Blockchain technology is a distributed ledger with records of data containing all details of the transactions carried out and distributed among the nodes present in the network. All the transactions carried out in the system are confirmed by consensus mechanisms, and the data once stored cannot be altered. Blockchain technology is the necessary technology behind Bitcoin, which is a popular digital Cryptocurrency. “Cloud computing is a practice of using a network of remote servers hosted on the internet to store, manage, and process data, rather than a local server or a personal computer.” It is still facing many challenges like data security, data management, compliance, reliability. In this article, we have mentioned some of the significant challenges faced by the cloud and proposed solutions by integrating it with blockchain technology. We tend to investigate a brief survey on earlier studies focused on blockchain integrating with the cloud to depict their supremacy. In this survey, we have also developed architecture integrating blockchain with cloud revealing the communication between blockchain and cloud.
N. Sánchez-Gómez, Jesús Torres Valderrama, J. A. García-García, Javier Gutiérrez · 5 authors
Blockchain technology promises to spark a real revolution. One of most important concepts associated with this technology is smart contracts, which enable the automatic execution of agreements and augur a world without intermediaries. The conditions and rules of “contracts” are established in a computer codes and trust is enforced by consensus among the participants. One relevant feature associated with smart contract is the immutability property, which establishes the non-alteration of blockchain network data after the clauses of the contract are been approved by all parties or entities involved. For this reason, smart contract development requires more effort and care than the development of other common programs. They require systematic mechanisms to collect requirements and functional specifications. In addition, it is necessary to verify and validate the agreed functionality and the implemented code before they are deployed in the blockchain platform. This article presents a systematic literature review of primary studies in the field of Software Development Life Cycle, focusing on model-based software design and testing in the blockchain domain of smart contracts. This research aims to identify gaps and/or opportunities for further research. After carried out this review, it was observed that no clear methodology exists for evaluating and validating the quality either of this software or the overall development process. This means that software developers may implement smart contract code in which bugs and serious security vulnerabilities appear when the software is delivered to their customers.
Dominik Roeck
Distributed ledger technology (DLT) appears to be one of the most promising technologies in the field of supply chain management (SCM). However, as the technology is still evolving, only limited empirical evidence has been analyzed, managers and scientific scholars alike seek to understand how DLT can help improving SCM. This study aims to shed light into the current DLT applications in SCM to identify the foundation of the technology for SCM and uncover what DLT brings to the table. It develops seven foundational characteristics of DLT in SCM that describe both the nature of DLT and its characteristics for SCM. The study reveals that DLTs are interorganizational information systems that are diverse in their realizations and enable modular platform ecosystems. Nowadays application in SCM build on steady data availability, selective transparency, high authenticity and a source of mutual trust.
Rui Wang, Kejiang Ye, Tianhui Meng, Chengzhong Xu
No abstract is available for this record.
Lin Zhang, Brian Lee, Yuhang Ye, Yuansong Qiao
No abstract is available for this record.
Kentaroh Toyoda, Koji Machi, Yutaka Ohtake, Allan N. Zhang
Private Ethereum blockchain-based systems are demanded in many industry sectors. However, the throughput performance of these systems does not meet their expectations. Many researchers have analyzed the performance of private blockchains, but their studies have failed to analyze root causes. In this paper, we perform a deep function-level bottleneck analysis for the private Ethereum blockchain. As the Ethereum client application is developed with golang, we leverage pprof, which is a resource-profiling tool for golang, and custom golang functions to measure the time taken by functions. To easily configure parameters and conduct our test, we code a shell script that automates the building process of a private Ethereum blockchain with docker containers. We conducted a series of experiments and identified the bottleneck function that is called every time a transaction arrives at an Ethereum node. In addition, we also found that the multi-threading is not well utilized, meaning that there is much room for improvement.
Lukas Aumayr, Matteo Maffei, Oğuzhan Ersoy, Andreas Erwig · 8 authors
Current permissionless cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin suffer from a limited transaction rate and slow confirmation time, which hinders further adoption. Payment channels are one of the most promising solutions to address these problems, as they allow the parties of the channel to perform arbitrarily many payments in a peer-to-peer fashion while uploading only two transactions on the blockchain. This concept has been generalized into payment channel networks where a path of payment channels is used to settle the payment between two users that might not share a direct channel between them. However, this approach requires the active involvement of each user in the path, making the system less reliable (they might be offline), more expensive (they charge fees per payment), and slower (intermediaries need to be actively involved in the payment). To mitigate this issue, recent work has introduced the concept of virtual channels (IEEE S&P’19), which involve intermediaries only in the initial creation of a bridge between payer and payee, who can later on independently perform arbitrarily many off-chain transactions. Unfortunately, existing constructions are only available for Ethereum, as they rely on its account model and Turing-complete scripting language. The realization of virtual channels in other blockchain technologies with limited scripting capabilities, like Bitcoin, was so far considered an open challenge.In this work, we present the first virtual channel protocols that are built on the UTXO-model and require a scripting language supporting only a digital signature scheme and a timelock functionality, being thus backward compatible with virtually every cryptocurrency, including Bitcoin. We formalize the security properties of virtual channels as an ideal functionality in the Universal Composability framework and prove that our protocol constitutes a secure realization thereof. We have prototyped and evaluated our protocol on the Bitcoin blockchain, demonstrating its efficiency: for n sequential payments, they require an off-chain exchange of 9+2n transactions or a total of 3524+695n bytes, with no on-chain footprint in the optimistic case. This is a substantial improvement compared to routing payments in a payment channel network, which requires 8n transactions with a total of 3026n bytes to be exchanged.
Markus Schinle, Christina Erler, Wilhelm Stork
Costs, risks and inefficiencies in Collaborative Networks (CNs) resulting from information asymmetries have been discussed in the scientific community for years. In this work, supply chain networks, as common representative of CNs, are used as object of investigation. Therein, problems and requirements of interorganizational information exchange are elaborated as well as the potential role Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) could play to address them. As major challenge, convincing all relevant network partners to resolve asymmetric information by sharing sensitive data is identified. To face this issue, the value of shared information is prioritized as a motivational aspect. Finally, we propose a search process to systematically assess the benefits of information sharing in collaborative networks. To coordinate and implement this process regarding the derived requirements of CNs we propose system components based on DLT design patterns.
Caixiang Fan, Sara Ghaemi, Hamzeh Khazaei, Petr Musı́lek
Blockchain has been envisioned to be a disruptive technology with potential for applications in various industries. As more and more different blockchain platforms have emerged, it is essential to assess their performance in different use cases and scenarios. In this paper, we conduct a systematic survey on the blockchain performance evaluation by categorizing all reviewed solutions into two general categories, namely, empirical analysis and analytical modelling. In the empirical analysis, we comparatively review the current empirical blockchain evaluation methodologies, including benchmarking, monitoring, experimental analysis and simulation. In analytical modelling, we investigate the stochastic models applied to performance evaluation of mainstream blockchain consensus algorithms. Through contrasting, comparison and grouping different methods together, we extract important criteria that can be used for selecting the most suitable evaluation technique for optimizing the performance of blockchain systems based on their identified bottlenecks. Finally, we conclude the survey by presenting a list of possible directions for future research.
Qiheng Zhou, Huawei Huang, Zibin Zheng, Jing Bian
Blockchain-based decentralized cryptocurrencies have drawn much attention and been widely-deployed in recent years. Bitcoin, the first application of blockchain, achieves great success and promotes more development in this field. However, Bitcoin encounters performance problems of low throughput and high transaction latency. Other cryptocurrencies based on proof-of-work also inherit the flaws, leading to more concerns about the scalability of blockchain. This paper attempts to cover the existing scaling solutions for blockchain and classify them by level. In addition, we make comparisons between different methods and list some potential directions for solving the scalability problem of blockchain.
Grant Chung, Luc Desrosiers, Manav Gupta, Andrew Sutton · 7 authors
Blockchain scalability can be complicated and costly. As enterprises begin to adopt blockchain technology to solve business problems, there are valid concerns if blockchain applications can support the transactional demands of production systems. In fact, the multiple distributed components and protocols that underlie blockchain applications makes performance optimization a non-trivial task. Blockchain performance optimization and scalability require a methodology to reduce complexity and cost. Furthermore, existing performance results often lack the requirements, load, and infrastructure of a production application. In this paper, we first develop a methodical approach to performance tuning enterprise blockchain applications to increase performance and transaction capacity. The methodology is applied to an enterprise blockchain-based application (leveraging Hyperledger Fabric) for performance tuning and optimization with the goal of bridging the gap between laboratory and production deployed system performance. We then present extensive results and analysis of our performance testing for on-premise and cloud deployments, in which we were able to scale the application from 30 to 3000 TPS without forking the Hyperledger Fabric source code and maintaining a reasonable infrastructure footprint. We also provide blockchain application and platform recommendations for performance improvement.
Yulong Zhao, Baoning Niu, Peng Li, Xing Fan
No abstract is available for this record.
Zhanghui Liu, Zhihao Huang, Xing Chen, Yan Chen
No abstract is available for this record.
Eranga Bandara, Wee Keong Ng, Nalin Ranasinghe, Kasun De Zoysa
No abstract is available for this record.
Tinu N. S.
Data analytics has captured attention of both researchers as well as business organizations, since a long time now, as the knowledge or information getting analyzed and evolved is priceless in upbringing the business. Blockchain is the latest technology which is getting adopted at a faster rate due to its unique properties. This paper focuses mainly on data models, and some tools used for data analytics being used in blockchain environment. Public blockchain is an open ledger platform which allows to perform data analytics.
Haoyu Wang, Lina Wang, Zhichao Zhou, Xueqiang Tao · 6 authors
Fog computing makes up for the shortcomings of cloud computing. It brings many advantages, but various peculiarities must be perceived, such as security, resource management, storage, and other features at the same time. This paper investigates the resource contribution model between the fog node and cloud or users when fog computing introduces blockchain. The proposed model practices the reward and punishment mechanism of the blockchain to boost the fog nodes to contribute resources actively. The behavior of the fog node in contributing resources and the completion degree of the task also for contributing resources are packaged into blocks and stored in the blockchain system to form a transparent, open, and tamper-free service evaluation index. The differential game method is employed to model and solve the above process and address the interaction between the optimal resource contribution strategy of the fog node and the optimal benefit under the optimal resource contribution strategy. Indirectly, this service evaluation index also brings long-term economic benefits to fog service providers. Besides, taking advantage of the performance characteristics of the collective maintenance of blockchain and the ability to establish a credible consensus mechanism in an untrusted environment, fog computing nodes, under the proposed architecture, can have specific security protection capabilities.
Authors unavailable
There are many consensus algorithms that exist in parallel computing that involve multiple computing units like virtual machines which make use of available resources and arrive at a single agreeable state for the combined system. This is done on the basis of voting which itself branches into several arrangements like voting, functions of central tendencies, weighted functions of central tendencies etc. Some applications that consensus algorithms try to cover are: deciding on transaction operations (read, write, commit); deciding on node leaders of a system; maintaining replicas in the state of a machine (also called a state machine) and creating consistency between them. Some common algorithms of this type are Proof of Work algorithm (PoW), the practical Byzantine fault tolerance algorithm (PBFT), the proof-of-stake algorithm (PoS) and the delegated proof-of-stake algorithm (DPoS), Paxos algorithm and the Raft consensus algorithm.
Eric Mantelaers, Martijn Zoet, Koen Smit
The current standard in accounting practice is the double-entry approach. Basis of the double-entry approach is that every financial event brings two equal and offsetting entries. Since these financial events are not automatically confirmed by both parties, the accounting quality can be improved. The blockchain mechanism possibly offers a different take on accounting. Based on an experimentation approach, data was collected to compare the double-entry method with the blockchain-based triple-entry method. The results show that the main difference concerns determining the completeness of the financial statement items. In the situation of double-entry accounting, segregation of duties is applied to do so. In the blockchain situation, the underlying mechanism of the blockchain already ensures this.
Andrzej Wilczyński, Joanna Kołodziej
No abstract is available for this record.
Nizamuddin Ariffin, Ahmad Zuhairi Ismail
Blockchain has grown beyond cryptocurrency. It has found a sweet spot in applications that required increased trust and transparency among multi-party transactions. This paper describes our experience in the design, implementation and architecture of blockchain-based trade finance application. The implementation is based on permissioned blockchain Hyperledger Fabric. Recently, the number of projects embarked on blockchain application have grown significantly over the year. However, the current level of understanding of blockchain application is insufficient and the architectural aspects of the system has remained largely unexplored. This paper attempts to solve this problem. It applies the concept of software connectors as a medium to explore fundamental building blocks of software interaction and how they are composed into a more complex interaction.
Jianrong Wang, Yangyifan Zhou, Xuewei Li, Tianyi Xu · 5 authors
The incumbent sharding schemes usually assign the nodes to different committees randomly to meet the demands of security and efficiency at the same time. For example, Elastico protocol obtains a random value by letting the node perform proof of work, and then uses this value for sharding. However, the strategy of random sharding ignores the objective differences between nodes, causing performance gaps between different committees in blockchain. This creates a bottleneck in the transaction throughput of the blockchain. In the paper, we propose a node rating based sharding scheme for blockchain system called NRSS. The key idea of NRSS is to evaluate nodes in the network by both the speeds and results of transactions verification before, and then assign them into different committees by balancing the score to reduce the performance gap between committees and increase the speed of transaction process. We implement NRSS in a local blockchain system, and the experiment results show that NRSS can increase the sharding effect of a blockchain, with an average throughput increase of 32.2% in the simulation environment where the node performance difference is up to 75%, depending on the number of nodes in the committee that are preset in the blockchain.
Nima Afraz, Marco Ruffini
In this paper, we propose a distributed market mechanism powered by the blockchain technology addressing network ownership models in multiple telecommunications networks use cases. The proposed model is based on the smart contract technology and enables transparent and trusted bilateral trades, where trust among the network operators does not exist, and there is no impartial third-party entity who is trusted by all of the participants. We use an open source permissioned blockchain framework called Hyperledger Fabric to investigate the performance of the distributed market mechanism in cloud environments. After running experiments on Hyperledger Fabric, we discuss the practical feasibility and possible design choices of our blockchain approach based on latency, throughput and resource consumption analysis.
Filipi Rydzi, Hong‐Linh Truong
The integration of Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud services with edge technologies has enabled the development of many new types of edge services, which leverage blockchain features for cross-organizational, traceable and verifiable records. However, developing such edge services with blockchain features requires not only knowledge about complex blockchain technologies but also how blockchain technologies coexist with edge computing service models and architectures and deployments. In the context of edge service development, coupling edge systems, software models for edge services and blockchain technologies is complex. Thus, a strong collaboration and knowledge sharing for edge systems and blockchain technologies will help addressing many concerns of the developer. However, there is a lack of frameworks for sharing knowledge about blockchain software artefacts and deployments for edge services. In this paper, we present various types of information linking blockchain performance with service deployments at different levels. We represent and associate benchmarked performance information of blockchain operation and blockchain infrastructural services with common edge service interactions and resource deployments. Based on that, we develop a service offering blockchain knowledge to the developer seeking relevant blockchain operation information for their development decisions. We will present a prototype of our framework with benchmarked information obtained from experiments with Ethereum and Hyperledger.