is going even further…this time to space. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration have teamed up with a researcher at the University of Akron to research the possibility of using Ethereum Blockchain Technology to enhance space communications and navigation. NASA gave the university a three year, $330,000 Early Career Faculty grant in order to lead a research on “Resilient Networking and Computing Paradigm using the blockchain technology that is behind smart contracts. In a statement from the university, they said;
“In this project the Ethereum blockchain technology will be exploited to develop a decentralised, secure, and cognitive networking and computing infrastructure for deep space exploration...The blockchain consensus protocols will be further explored to improve the resilience of the infrastructure. I hope to develop technology that can recognise environmental threats and avoid them, as well as complete a number of tasks automatically.”
Dr Wei, who is fronting the research, believes that if this is carried out properly, it will give room to spacecraft to achieve more tasks and collect data, as well as giving scientists the time to respond to environmental threats. Thomas Kacpura, who is the advanced communications programme manager at NASA’s Glenn Research Centre supports the research, saying that it is the first of its kind. Speaking about the research, he said;
"The effort would support decentralised processing among NASA space network nodes in a secure fashion, resulting in a more responsive, resilient scalable network that can integrate current and future networks in a consistent manner. It is expected that the potential is high to contribute to the next generation space networks, and also allow tech transition of these algorithms for commercial systems.”
Ethereum is gaining popularity by the day, so this research will be really great for it. There is hope that Ethereum will become the top smart contracting platform of the twenty first century. Featured Image Original Source: Pixabay