BLOCKCHAIN

INTRODUCTION
Nowadays cryptocurrency has become a buzzword in both industry and
academia. As one of the most successful cryptocurrency, Bitcoin has enjoyed a
huge success with its capital market reaching 10 billion dollars in 2016 [1]. With
a specially designed data storage structure, transactions in Bitcoin network
could happen without any third party and the core technology to build Bitcoin is
blockchain, which was first proposed in 2008 and implemented in 2009 [2].
Blockchain could be regarded as a public ledger and all committed transactions
are stored in a list of blocks. This chain grows as new blocks are appended to it
continuously. Asymmetric cryptography and distributed consensus algorithms
have been implemented for user security and ledger consistency. The blockchain
technology generally has key characteristics of decentralization, persistency,
anonymity and auditability. With these traits, blockchain can greatly save the
cost and improve the efficiency.
OBJECTIVE
1. A blockchain technology is an online ledger that user data structure,
to simplify the way we transact.
2. It allows users to manipulate the ledger in a secure way without the
help of a third party.
3. It allows a free cryptocurrency through a decentralized environment.
4. It provides great transparency because it is a type of distributed
ledger. So our network participants share the same documentation
as opposed to individual topics.
5. With blockchain, you do not need as many third parties or middleman
to make guarantee and so, the cost can be reduced.
6. This technology offers new tools for authentication and authorization
in the digital world that fulfill the needs of many centralized
administrators. As a result, it enables the creation of new digital
relationships.
APPLICATIONS

1:Your car/ smartphone

Primitive forms of smart property exist. Your car-key, for instance,
may be outfitted with an immobilizer, where the car can only be activated
once you tap the right protocol on the key. Your smartphone too will only
function once you type in the right PIN code. Both work on cryptography
to protect your ownership.
The problem with primitive forms of smart property is that the key is
usually held in a physical container, such as the car key or SIM card, and
can’t be easily transferred or copied. The blockchain ledger solves this
problem by allowing blockchain miners to replace and replicate a lost
protocol.
1:Blockchain Internet-of-Things (IoT)
Any material object is a ‘thing.’ It becomes an internet of things (IoT)
when it has an on/ off switch that connects it to the internet and to each
other. By being connected to a computer network, the object, such as a car,
become more than just an object. It is now people-people, people-things,
and things-things. The analyst firm Gartner says that by 2020 there will be
over 26 billion connected devices. Others raise that number to over 100!
How does the IoT affect you? Your printer can automatically order
cartridges from Amazon when it runs low. Your alarm clock will change
your time for brewing coffee, while your oven will produce an
immaculately timed turkey for Thanksgiving. These are just some
examples. On a larger scale, cities and governments can use IoT to
develop cleaner environments, more efficient energy use and so-called
‘smart cities,’ to improve how we live and work.
CONCLUSION
Blockchain has shown its potential for transforming traditional
industry with its key characteristics: decentralization, persistency,
anonymity and auditability. In this paper, we present a
comprehensive overview on blockchain. We first give an overview of
blockchain technologies including blockchain architecture and key
characteristics of blockchain. We then discuss the typical consensus
algorithms used in blockchain. We analyzed and compared these
protocols in different respects. Furthermore, we listed some
challenges and problems that would hinder blockchain development
and summarized some existing approaches for solving these
problems. Some possible future directions are also proposed.
Nowadays blockchainbased applications are springing up and we
plan to conduct in-depth investigations on blockchain-based
applications in the future.

REFERENCES:
[1] “State of blockchain q1 2016: Blockchain funding overtakes bitcoin,” 2016.
[Online]. Available: http://www.coindesk.com/ state-of-blockchain-q1-2016/