Harnessing Energy from Bitcoin Mining to Sequence Genetic Data – The Cointelegraph

By Joshua Althauser    December 19, 2017

Intel has filed a patent for a type of Blockchain system that uses energy from proof-of-work (POW) crypto mining for genetic data sequencing.

Eliminating waste

Bitcoin has frequently been criticized for the network’s high energy use, and waste of energy is in fact one of the leading arguments for proof-of-stake (POS) protocols. Intel is seeking not to reduce Bitcoin’s energy use per se, but to harness the power that’s already being consumed to serve another purpose.

Since miners would be accomplishing two tasks simultaneously — regular crypto mining and nucleobase sequencing– the inventors refer to this type of POW as “multipurpose.” Comparing the process to traditional Bitcoin mining, they state:

“The present disclosure, by contrast [to traditional Bitcoin mining] involves a Blockchain protocol which, when implemented in a Blockchain system, enables miners to accomplish additional useful work while generating proofs of work (POWs) for new blocks. In particular, as described in greater detail below, miners determine sequences of nucleobases when generating POWs. And since a miner accomplishes additional useful work while generating a POW, the POW may be referred to as a ‘multipurpose POW,’ and the work to create the POW may be referred to as ‘multipurpose POW operations.’

More at: Harnessing Energy from Bitcoin Mining to Sequence Genetic Data – The Cointelegraph

IBM: Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence Combo to Alter Healthcare – HealthIT Analytics

The combination of blockchain and artificial intelligence has the potential to completely overhaul healthcare in just a few short years.

By Jennifer Bresnick    November 2, 2017

The combination of blockchain and artificial intelligence could bring significant improvements to a healthcare sector plagued by interoperability problems and big data analytics shortfalls, says IBM Watson Health Chief Science Officer Shahram Ebadollahi.

Speaking at the Fast Company Innovation Festival in late October, Ebadollahi announced that the company would be expanding its exploration of healthcare blockchain opportunities with a new CDC partnership, according to reporter Jay Woodruff.

The CDC has already been engaged in blockchain pilots around public health responses and crisis situations, and is looking to further its ability to define value-driven use cases for the technology.

The new partnership will complement an existing collaboration between IBM Watson and the FDA, giving IBM additional insight into how blockchain, in tandem with artificial intelligence, could overhaul the way stakeholders extract meaning from the overwhelming volume of big data in the industry.

More at: IBM: Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence Combo to Alter Healthcare – HealthIT Analytics

How Blockchain Can Be Used to Monetize Data – HuffPost

By Jason Choi, Contributor    October 26, 2017

With the rise of Bitcoin, cryptocurrencies have attracted speculative investors around the world, amateur and institutional alike.

Institutions, such as banks, on the other hand, are more interested in blockchain – the underlying technology that powers cryptoassets such as Bitcoin – due to its security, transparency and immutability. While the majority of consortia and institutions focus on developing blockchain solutions for the financial purposes, the types of transactions that blockchain enable can extend far beyond banks.

With Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank dedicating $100 billion in its Vision Fund to invest in data companies, it comes as no surprise that it was a matter of time before someone combined the breakthrough technology of blockchain with the ever-developing field of data.

More at: How Blockchain Can Be Used to Monetize Data – HuffPost

How blockchain will transform big data analytics – The London Economic

By Jess Young    October 12, 2017

It’s no secret that big data analytics is taking the business world by storm, imparting a whole new world of corporate intelligence value. What is not so clear is how businesses seek to deal with the copious quantities of data that will be generated by big data applications. Blockchain poses a possible solution as it represent an immutable, consensus driven, self-verified platform for transactions. Clear audit trails and transparency regarding data origin all contributes to an effective framework for dealing with the complexities of big data.

Besides improved data integrity, blockchain technology introduces a shared data layer that opens up greater possibilities of artificial intelligence and understanding of the scale of this technology and its AI applications.

More at: How blockchain will transform big data analytics – The London Economic

Archaeology and blockchain: a social science data revolution – The Guardian

Blockchain technology is revolutionising financial systems. Could it do the same for archaeological data?

This month the world’s first “archaeology coin” launched to fanfare from a small community; however, it might be part of a coming social science data revolution. Named Kapu, the digital currency is similar to Bitcoin, but specifically designed for archaeology. The technology underlying Kapu and Bitcoin is called blockchain and it may change data storage and cultural heritage protection. While the public is unaccustomed with blockchain, there is good reason to believe we may be witnessing the first step in what will become a standard technology over the next decade.

Everyone from financial markets and politicians to libertarians and doomsday savers are taking an interested in blockchain. Many of these individuals are not focused on the currencies, but the use of blockchain as a means to store and share data. It can create a record of assets that cannot be tampered with and it is being tested for assets such as homes and cars, organic food and sustainable fisheries, and, of course, artifacts.

More at: Archaeology and blockchain: a social science data revolution? – The Guardian

MIT And BU Researchers Uncover A Serious Flaw In Internet-Of-Things Blockchain IOTA – Forbes Digital Money #NewTech

IOTA, the blockchain that supports Internet of things (IoT) transactions, was shown to have “serious weaknesses,” according to a report by a group of researchers at MIT and Boston University.

“When we took a look at their system, we found a serious vulnerability and textbook insecure code,” Neha Narula, director at MIT Digital Coin Initiative and a researcher involved in uncovering the flaw, wrote in a blog post.

Specifically, Narula and three other researchers claim they were able to break the homegrown hash function “Curl” that IOTA was using as part of its digital signature scheme, which ensures funds can only be spent by rightful owners. They then demonstrated how an attacker could forge a digital signature to steal a user’s funds.

 It’s important to note that IOTA has since fixed the flaw. Researchers notified IOTA of their initial findings in late July. In response, the project deployed a type of software upgrade known as a hard fork, on August 7, to stop using Curl for signatures. During that upgrade, Bitfinix, the only exchange where IOTA is traded, halted withdrawals and deposits of IOTA for three days.

IOTA is currently worth nearly $2 billion, according Coin Market Cap, making it the eighth largest cryptocurrency. The project pulled in 1,337 bitcoin (valued at $500,000 at the time) in an initial coin offering (ICO) in late 2015. And, through its Trusted IOT Alliance, the project partners with several notable companies, including Microsoft.

More at: MIT And BU Researchers Uncover A Serious Flaw In Internet-Of-Things Blockchain IOTA – Forbes Digital Money #NewTech

By 2025, Blockchain, IoT, Machine Learning Will Converge in Healthcare – HealthIT Analytics

Blockchain, machine learning, and the Internet of Things are on a collision course, which could be the best thing to happen to healthcare.

Within the next five to ten years, healthcare organizations are likely to have access to integrated health IT platforms based on an emerging set of information management technologies including blockchain, the Internet of Things (IoT), and machine learning, predicts Frost & Sullivan.

The convergence of these big data analytics and access methodologies will accelerate the growing trend of data decentralization and consumer access to personal health information by making it easier for all members of a patient’s care team to stay securely informed, involved, and interoperable with one another.

“A blockchain-based system will enable unprecedented collaboration, bolstering innovation in medical research and the execution of larger healthcare concepts such as precision medicine and population health management,” explained Transformational Health Industry Analyst Kamaljit Behera.

Blockchain leverages a distributed ledger system, in which every member of the community holds identical records of all transactions conducted between them.

Every entity that holds a copy of a ledger must approve any and all changes to the dataset before it can be conducted, providing a more secure way to ensure that access and edits are authorized.

More at: By 2025, Blockchain, IoT, Machine Learning Will Converge in Healthcare – HealthIT Analytics

What can be uncovered when big data meets the blockchain – InfoWorld

As blockchain technology continues to be explode in popularity and be adopted by organizations around the world, new types of data are becoming available for analysis by the most recent big data technologies

As defined by the World Economic Forum (WEF), “Blockchain technology allows parties to transfer assets to each other in a secure way without intermediaries. It enables transparency, immutable records, and autonomous execution of business rules.”

Investments in the blockchain are on the rise. Banks, private businesses, and even governments are investing in the technology. The WEF predicts that smart contracts alone on the blockchain could equal 10 percent of the global GDP by 2027. As with any new technology, it’s important to note the value of the data that comes with it. And arguably the most valuable data involved with blockchain technology is that of virtual currency use.

Over the past few years, and with the development of bitcoin, the use of virtual currencies is gaining momentum around the world. However, the currencies remain unpredictable and only partially understood, even by experts. To create clarity, organizations interested in the blockchain, and more specifically bitcoin, are beginning to use big data to provide insights into the virtual currency’s future performance. The IDC recently reported that global IT spending is in the trillions and big data revenues will grow to more than $203 billion by 2020. By 2027, the value of big data as a service is predicted to be between $500 billion and $1 trillion, and managing virtual currency on the blockchain could account for a significant portion of that revenue.

Many of the best ways to realize the full potential of the virtual currency, and alleviate some of the risks involved, may be by harnessing its big data. As the blockchain is essentially a ledger that every bitcoin transaction must pass through for verification by the millions of other peer-to-peer users, the insights to be collected from that ledger are potentially endless. And even though there is no identifying information in a transaction on the blockchain itself (the blockchain only knows the two wallets that exchanged the currency and the amount), all transactions are public and each user’s activities are visible to everyone on the blockchain.

Organizations are beginning to perform data analysis on virtual currency activities to uncover powerful insights into trends and events surrounding currencies like bitcoin. So what type of trends can be revealed? Here’s a brief overview of what data enthusiasts are beginning to unmask in the world of the blockchain and cryptocurrencies with a big data mindset and the right data analytics tools.

More at: What can be uncovered when big data meets the blockchain – InfoWorld