Blockchains are a new settlement and ownership layer, one that’s programmable, open, and global by default, unlocking new forms of entrepreneurship, creativity, and infrastructure. Growth in monthly active crypto addresses is generally tracking the
Prediction markets are a hot topic again — even cartoon characters are talking about them (cf South Park). But beyond the buzz, what is a prediction market, exactly? How do they work, how are they designed, and what makes them work?
We answer all
Proof-of-Replication (PoRep) plays a pivotal role in decentralized storage networks, serving as a mechanism to verify that provers consistently store retrievable copies of specific data. PoRep’s implementation in large-scale systems such as Filecoin has been hindered by scalability challenges. Most existing PoRep schemes face an escalating number of challenges and growing computational overhead as the number of stored files increases.
Foteini Baldimtsi (George Mason University, Mysten Labs) introduces a novel PoRep scheme distinctively tailored for expansive decentralized storage networks. This approach hinges on polynomial evaluation, diverging from the probabilistic checking used in prior works. This design requires only a single challenge, irrespective of the number of files, ensuring both prover’s and verifier’s run-times remain manageable even as file counts soar.
This is joint work with Giuseppe Ateniese, Matteo Campanelli, Danilo Francati and Ioanna Karantaidou
About the presenter Foteini is an Associate Professor in the Computer Science Department at George Mason University and Research Advisor in the Cryptography team of Mysten Labs. She received her Ph.D. from Brown University in May 2014 and worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Boston University and University of Athens. Her research interests include cryptography, security, and data privacy. She is a recipient of an NSF CAREER award as well as Google, IBM, and Facebook faculty awards. Her research is funded by NSF, DHS, NSA, CCI, Protocol Labs and the Zcash Foundation.
About a16z crypto research a16z crypto research is a multidisciplinary lab that works closely with our portfolio companies and others toward solving the important problems in the space, and toward advancing the science and technology of the next generation of the internet.
More about us: a16z.com/2022/04/21/announcing-a16z-crypto-research More from the a16z crypto team – Subscribe to our ‘web3 weekly newsletter’: a16zcrypto.substack.com – Listen to our ‘web3 with a16z’ podcast: a16zcrypto.com/web3-with-a16z-podcast/ – Read more of our work: a16zcrypto.com
