Research into the possibilities of improving Proof-of-Work blockchain technology

Abstract

This work is devoted to tothe research into the possibilities of improving Proof-of-Work blockchain technology based on dynamic clustering of nodes to reduce transaction time.To eliminate the problem with the Proof-of-Work mechanism, which is considered in this work, it is necessary to solve the problem of reducing the amount of time spent on a transaction. It is proposed to implement this by dividing the system into subnets: when the consensus is not accepted by the entire community, but it is accepted by groups separately –thus minimizing the transaction time in the Proof-of-Statealgorithm. There is no ready-made solution for the Proof-of-Workdynamic consensus mechanism that would be successfully applied in blockchain technologies. All existing algorithms for dividing the blockchain network into subgroups are used only for static algorithms, but Proof-of-Workis dynamic and has certain features: there is no scope;the user does not see the list of nodes. These features greatly complicate the implementation of clustering for the Proof-of-Workconsensus mechanism.The task of this study is the formulation of hypotheses and the verification of the formulated hypotheses, which are aimed at increasing the speed of the transaction. For verification, it is proposed to simulate a blockchain network to conduct experiments and test hypotheses that can potentially solve the Proof-of-Work problem.To develop a wayforimproving the Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism by implementing dynamic clustering of network nodes, flexibility and scalability, minimal impact on the existing blockchain protocol are taken into account, security issues are also important, managementof the process of accepting new nodes to avoid possible attacks and ensure integrity and network security.Existing methods of improving Proof-of-Worktechnology, clustering methods that can be applied to the network are analyzed;problems that arise when developing a new technique are identified. A blockchainnetwork modeling system has been developed and implemented, with the help of which the approach of dynamic grouping of nodes of the blockchain network, in which the system is divided into subsystems,is implemented.The results of the study allow us to conclude: the cluster system gives improved values of the number of transactions per second (by two hundredthstransactions), average transaction time (by one and sixty-seven hundredthsseconds), throughput (by two tenthstransactions), transaction delay (by one and six hundred sixty-seven thousandths seconds) and significantly reduces the total energy consumption of the system (a difference of five thousand, one hundred twenty-two units). This indicates the potential of the proposed method in various practical applications.