Blockchain and Proof of Storage

Glossary

Blockchain: A growing distributed database that records transaction information and is secured by cryptography.

Mining Node: A node that participates in a blockchain network and performs mining operations.

Proof of Storage (PoS): A cryptographic proof that a storage provider actually stores specific data.

Proof of Work (PoW): A consensus mechanism that requires a node to perform a certain amount of computational work in order to add a new block to the blockchain.

Nonce: A random number that miners need to find to solve the PoW puzzle and add a new block to the blockchain.

Coinbase Transaction: The first transaction in each block, used to reward miners.

Shard: Splitting blockchain data into smaller parts for easier storage and management.

Challenge-response protocol: A protocol for verifying identity or data integrity, in which one party issues a challenge and the other party must provide a correct response.

Merkle Tree: A data structure used to efficiently verify the integrity of large amounts of data.

GBT (GetBlockTemplate): A mining protocol used by pool servers to provide miners with templates for blocks to be mined.

STM (Stratum Mining): A mining protocol used by pool servers to assign work to miners and receive work results.

Short Answer Question

Briefly describe the benefits of integrating PoS into blockchain

Integrating PoS into blockchain can improve the security, robustness, and verifiability of blockchain networks. It ensures redundant storage of blockchain data and prevents data loss or corruption by requiring miners to provide proof of storage during the PoW process.

Explain how BitcoinPlus selects the portion of blockchain data to store

BitcoinPlus selects the portion of blockchain data to store by extending the coinbase transaction. Each miner node selects a shard to store based on a unique value or identifier, ensuring that the entire blockchain data is stored by all nodes.

Describe the challenge-response protocol used in PoS

In the challenge-response protocol of PoS, the validator sends a challenge to the node storing the data, which is usually a subset of the stored data. The node needs to provide a corresponding response based on the challenge to prove that it does store the data.

Why does BitcoinPlus limit the search order of Nonce?

BitcoinPlus forces all miners to search for Nonce in the same order to prevent miners in the mining pool from colluding or duplicating work, thereby improving mining efficiency and enhancing network security.

How does PoWeR ensure redundant storage of blockchain data?

PoWeR divides blockchain data into multiple shards and requires each miner node to store different shards. This shard storage mechanism ensures the redundancy of blockchain data, and data will not be lost even if some nodes fail.

Explain the two mining phases used in PoWeR

PoWeR includes two mining phases: the first phase is to determine the set of transactions to be included in the next block. Miners need to find a nonce that makes the hash value of the transaction set below a certain threshold; the second phase is to find a nonce that makes the hash value of the block header containing the valid transaction set and PoS below the target value.

Why does the shard size in PoWeR increase with the increase of blockchain length?

PoWeR requires each miner node to store a part of the blockchain data. As the length of the blockchain increases, the amount of data that each shard needs to store will also increase accordingly.

Briefly describe the main differences between GBT and STM protocols

In the GBT protocol, the mining pool server provides the miners with the template of the block to be mined, and the miners can modify some of the content based on the template; while in the STM protocol, the mining pool server directly assigns specific work tasks to the miners, and the miners can only complete the assigned tasks.

Why is PoWeR not affecting the efficiency of existing mining hardware?

PoWeR requires only minor modifications to the existing PoW protocol and does not require any changes to existing mining hardware, so it will not affect its mining efficiency.

Summarize the main advantages of PoWeR

The main advantages of PoWeR include: enhancing the security of blockchain data, improving the robustness of the blockchain network, incentivizing miner nodes to store blockchain data, compatibility with existing mining hardware, and easy integration into existing mining protocols.

Paper title

Compare and contrast the mechanisms of BitcoinPlus and PoWeR in ensuring blockchain data storage, and discuss their advantages and disadvantages.

Analyze how the incentive mechanism in the PoW system affects the storage of blockchain data, and explore how to design more effective incentive mechanisms to encourage data storage.

Study the application of sharding technology in blockchain, and discuss the impact of different sharding schemes on data storage and network performance.

Explore how PoS can be used in combination with other consensus mechanisms (e.g., proof of stake) to build a more secure and efficient blockchain system.

Analyze the challenges of integrating PoS into blockchain, such as data privacy, storage cost, and verification efficiency, and propose corresponding solutions.