Hierarchical reference shard cross-shard transaction processing for blockchains

Abstract

In the present work it is proposed to study hierarchical implementations for a reference shard in sharded blockchain environments. Classic sharded blockchains suffer from low cross-shard transaction throughput, given that common cross-shard protocols such as two phase commit, compromise throughput to prioritize consistency. The results of this study could lead to the creation of better sharded blockchain systems with enhanced cross-shard throughput with no compromises to system consistency. This research will use simulations with real main net transactions with the intent of analyzing the yield in performance that having a hierarchical structure of reference shards could have in cross-shard transaction throughput and latency. The results of this experiments will be statistically analyzed (ANOVA) to determine that there could be a significant advantage of using a hierarchical implementation against using a single reference shard implementation.