IEEE International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications
31 August-3 September 2020 // Virtual Conference

T05: Wireless Blockchain: PHY, MAC and Network Perspectives

Instructors

Lei Zhang,
University of Glasgow, UK

Bin Cao,
Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, CN

Muhammad Imran,
University of Glasgow, UK

Register

£50 Tutorial only | Tutorial + Full Conference access from £120

Half-day Tutorial, Monday 31st August 9:00 (BST)
Further pricing details can be found on the registration page.

Register Now

Motivation

Essentially, blockchain is a peer-to-peer network that relies on frequent communications within the consensus network. However, major blockchains are primarily designed in stable wired communication networks running in advanced devices. Hence, the performance and security level degradation caused by communication is negligible. While this is not the case for high dynamic wireless connected digital society that is mainly composed of massive wireless devices. Especially through the upcoming 5G, majority of valuable information exchange may be through wireless medium.

To apply blockchain in wireless environments, it is important to identify the communication procedures and roles in wireless blockchain system; and how much communication resource is needed to run a wireless blockchain network (WBN) securely. Moreover, it is an interesting topic that how the communication resource provision affects the blockchain performance such as scalability, throughput, latency and security level. The answers relate to the wireless blockchain network topology (e.g., tree, mesh, etc.), communication protocols (e.g., grant-based or contention-based), routing and scheduling.

This tutorial is comprised of three parts with the following clear objectives:

  1. Present the concept of wireless blockchain networks, with different network topology and communication protocols, for various commonly used blockchains. Present the relationship between the communication (in terms of spectrum and power provision), and the wireless blockchain network performance (in terms of scalability, throughput and latency, and security).
  2. Present MAC procedure the role of wireless blockchain network. Explain the delay caused by queueing, scheduling and transmission following MAC and the reason why blockchain system performance and security may face a bottleneck.
  3. Present the limitations for existing blockchain application in wireless networks, in terms of network behaviour modelling, consensus process modelling and so on, in addition to the related mathematical methods of analysis.

Content and structure

Part I: Blockchain Basics and Consensus Mechanisms

  1. Blockchain Basics
    • what is blockchain
    • why do we need blockchain
    • different types of blockchains
    • blockchain applications
  2. Blockchain Consensus Mechanisms
    • Proof-based blockchain
    • Voting-based blockchain (e.g., RAFT and PBFT)

Part II: Wireless Blockchain: PHY Perspective

  1. 1. Role of communication in blockchain
    • procedures of different blockchains
    • role of communication in blockchain network
    • how communication can affect the blockchain performance
  2. How Much Communication Is Needed to Run a Wireless Blockchain Network
    • communication complexity of WBN
    • communication power for WBN
    • communication nodes deployment for WBN

Part III: WCN: MAC Perspective

  1. Wireless Blockchain MAC
    • queueing, scheduling and transmission
    • impact on consensus
    • modelling and analysis
  2. How MAC Affects Wireless Blockchain System
    • double-spending attack
    • security and performance analysis

Part IV: WCN: Network Perspective

    • dilemma between blockchain and network: architecture and protocol
    • stochastic process for WBN
    • game theory for WBN

Hosting Universities