A public blockchain consensus mechanism for fault-tolerant distributed computing in LEO satellite communications

Abstract

In LEO (Low Earth Orbit) satellite communication systems, the satellite network is made up of a large number of satellites, the dynamically changing network environment affects the results of distributed computing. In order to improve the fault tolerance rate, a novel public blockchain consensus mechanism that applies a distributed computing architecture in a public network is proposed. Redundant calculation of blockchain ensures the credibility of the results; and the transactions with calculation results of a task are stored distributed in sequence in Directed Acyclic Graphs (DAG). The transactions issued by nodes are connected to form a net. The net can quickly provide node reputation evaluation that does not rely on third parties. Simulations show that our proposed blockchain has the following advantages: 1. The task processing speed of the blockchain can be close to that of the fastest node in the entire blockchain; 2. When the tasks' arrival time intervals and demanded working nodes(WNs) meet certain conditions, the network can tolerate more than 50% of malicious devices; 3. No matter the number of nodes in the blockchain is increased or reduced, the network can keep robustness by adjusting the task's arrival time interval and demanded WNs.