Cryptocurrencies and their underlying distributed ledger protocols (blockchains) are spurring an ecosystem of decentralized applications and innovation systems.

Currently, the market value of cryptocurrencies is value at about 2.48 trillion dollars; and its acceptance by institutional and commercial players is steadily increasing. Increasingly, smart contracts programs that run on blockchains are showcasing a new paradigm for transparent and trustworthy computing.

There are several security issues with blockchain, which our centre aims to explore and find solutions to:

• Vulnerabilities of computers that individuals and business use to retrieve blockchain services

• Hackers retrieving the keys to someone’s data on blockchain and being able to own it completely, as possessing with public and private key to a blockchain is synonymous with owning the content

• Constant scaling up of the chain means there is no certain way to confirm it will stay secure

• Blockchain is experimental and there is code that hasn’t been tested

• The lack of standards and regulation

Cryptocurrency markets do not have clear fundamentals understanding of causality and correlation between token prices. CRYSTAL Centre will build capability and phrase measurable scientific analytics of Cryptocurrency markets drivers. Example including: liquidity and valuations, virtual sandbox for market analysis. AI vs AI research, applying deep learning to improve level 3 order book processing, and training fund for real market activity.

Our goal is to design and analyse new algorithms which allow scaling with network size or consumption power, and lowering energy consumption. Consensus protocols in blockchains differ from traditional networks because the set of participants in the protocols are not fixed and not know in advance to each other. We have recently shown how to use proof of work (POW) as a basis for reconciling differing views in a peer to peer network with open (and potentially infinite) membership.