Logo
ScienceStack
Table of Contents
Fetching ...
Sign In

SCRamble: Adaptive Decentralized Overlay Construction for Blockchain Networks

Evangelos Kolyvas, Alexandros Antonov, Spyros Voulgaris

TL;DR

Block propagation latency in blockchain P2P networks limits throughput and forks, motivating an adaptive overlay design. SCRamble jointly uses a scoring heuristic, which rewards neighbors by rapid block relay, and a close heuristic, which favors low-latency links, while maintaining random connections to preserve global reach; these are applied over three neighbor sets derived from a random peer sampling process. The paper formalizes the scoring via timing gaps $t_2-t_1$ and periodic reconfiguration with parameter $k$, and demonstrates that applying both heuristics to the majority of neighbors (e.g., $S=3$, $C=3$, $R=2$) yields the best dissemination performance under varied per-block delays and RTTs. The approach promises faster block propagation and reduced fork risk, enabling higher effective throughput and stronger security in realistic network conditions.

Abstract

Despite being under development for over 15 years, transaction throughput remains one of the key challenges confronting blockchains, which typically has a cap of a limited number of transactions per second. A fundamental factor limiting this metric is the network latency associated with the block propagation throughout of the underlying peer-to-peer network, typically formed through random connections. Accelerating the dissemination of blocks not only improves transaction rates, but also enhances system security by reducing the probability of forks. This paper introduces SCRamble: a decentralized protocol that significantly reduces block dissemination time in blockchain networks. SCRamble's effectiveness is attributed to its innovative link selection strategy, which integrates two heuristics: a scoring mechanism that assesses block arrival times from neighboring peers, and a second heuristic that takes network latency into account.

SCRamble: Adaptive Decentralized Overlay Construction for Blockchain Networks

TL;DR

Block propagation latency in blockchain P2P networks limits throughput and forks, motivating an adaptive overlay design. SCRamble jointly uses a scoring heuristic, which rewards neighbors by rapid block relay, and a close heuristic, which favors low-latency links, while maintaining random connections to preserve global reach; these are applied over three neighbor sets derived from a random peer sampling process. The paper formalizes the scoring via timing gaps and periodic reconfiguration with parameter , and demonstrates that applying both heuristics to the majority of neighbors (e.g., , , ) yields the best dissemination performance under varied per-block delays and RTTs. The approach promises faster block propagation and reduced fork risk, enabling higher effective throughput and stronger security in realistic network conditions.

Abstract

Despite being under development for over 15 years, transaction throughput remains one of the key challenges confronting blockchains, which typically has a cap of a limited number of transactions per second. A fundamental factor limiting this metric is the network latency associated with the block propagation throughout of the underlying peer-to-peer network, typically formed through random connections. Accelerating the dissemination of blocks not only improves transaction rates, but also enhances system security by reducing the probability of forks. This paper introduces SCRamble: a decentralized protocol that significantly reduces block dissemination time in blockchain networks. SCRamble's effectiveness is attributed to its innovative link selection strategy, which integrates two heuristics: a scoring mechanism that assesses block arrival times from neighboring peers, and a second heuristic that takes network latency into account.
Paper Structure (7 sections, 3 figures, 2 algorithms)

This paper contains 7 sections, 3 figures, 2 algorithms.

Table of Contents

  1. Blockchain Dissemination Background
  2. The SCRamble Protocol
  3. The Scoring heuristic
  4. The Close heuristic
  5. Experimental Setup
  6. Evaluation of SCRamble's Link Selection Policy: Scoring vs. Close vs. Random
  7. Conclusions

Figures (3)

  • Figure 1: Blocks should be propagated to a few nearby and to a few distant nodes (close heuristic).
  • Figure 2: Links are shared among three different sets: Scoring (S), Close (C), and Random (R). Experimental space with 10 links.
  • Figure 3: Dissemination progress over time for different setups of body validation delay and total RTTs per block transfer respectively. (a) 50 msec, 1.5 RTTs (default scenario), (b) 20 msec, 1.5 RTTs (lower delay), (c) 100 msec, 1.5 RTTs (higher delay), (d) 50 msec, 0.5 RTTs (fewer RTTs), (e) 50 msec, 3.5 RTTs (more RTTs)