Distributed Computing
ETH Zurich

Gran Sasso Science Institute Block Course on Blockchain, L'Aquila, Italy, July, 2019


I cover a variety of topics on permissioned and permissionless blockchains. The morning lecture is for those participants who have never heard of fault-tolerant distributed systems. I cover some basic material which is often taught in computer sciences courses on distributed systems, such as Paxos, Consensus, Byzantine Fault-Tolerance. The second part is on permissionless blockchains: Bitcoin, Channels, Ethereum, Selfish Mining, DAGs. The first two parts are mostly taken from this class.

The third and final part is on current research. This part may also be interesting for those who know blockchains well, e.g. Sirocco attendees. The third part is tailored a bit towards a Sirocco audience, i.e., explain some interesting aspects that are related to information in networks.


Lecture Material: