In an increasingly interconnected world with mutually distrustfulor partially distrustful stakeholders, the implementation of a robust and high-performance transaction and smart contract systems has grown in importance. Consequently, providing appropriate Security, Performance, and Usability characteristics is a key requirement for novel DLT and blockchain technologies. Security, Usability, Performance, and Privacy Research in Algorand (ACE-SUPPRA) is a joined effort of the Blockchain Research Cluster of Technical University of Munich (TUM). The combination of the involved research groups allows an interdisciplinary view and contributions, providing insights into technological, economic, and social aspects of blockchain technologies centered around Algorand protocol. Besides, each research group can profit from the available expertise of all its adjacent research staff members.
Each research group plans to provide improvements based on their key competencies. The Chair of Network Architectures and Services (NET) led by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Georg Carle targets assessment of the Algorand infrastructure, aiming for the improvement of its performance, and research of more secure and privacy-preserving techniques for the Algorand users. In a similar direction, the Chair of Integrated Systems (LIS) of Prof. Dr. sc. techn. Andreas Herkersdorf aims to quantify potential performance enhancements using smartNICs to which certain operations can be offloaded. A key factor to blockchain adaption and usability are smart contract capabilities that will be investigated by the Chair for Software and Systems Engineering (SSE) of Prof. Dr. Alexander Pretschner with an aim to improve their robustness, quality, and security. With more focus on secure usability Chair for Software Engineering for Business Information Systems (SEBIS), led by Prof. Dr. Florian Matthes, plans to offer solutions to minimize the risks and overhead caused by smart contract development. Finally, the crucial aspect of tokenomics and governance of Algorand will be the main focus of the Chair for Strategy and Organization (SAO) of Prof. Dr. Isabell Welpe.
ACE-SUPPRA: https://suppra.net.in.tum.de/
Official Algorand page: https://www.algorand.foundation/ace