Nerves Blockchain is designed to run as a network that is supportive of chains that exist on the platform. In other words, private and dedicated chains are allowed to exist as branch chains, independent chains or standalone chains. Irrespective of how the chains are described, they operate as a kind of a blockchain within the Nerves Blockchain.

Since it first hit the tech market, the Blockchain innovation has continued to expand its base, with its adoption growing by the day. It is widely regarded as the second best invention after the internet.

On a blockchain, the evaluation and verification of Blockchain operations are based on nodes (computers) on the network reaching a consensus. A peculiar property of the Blockchain is that it gives room for the exchange of value without the involvement or intervention of a trusted third party (TTP) or central authority, hence, its decentralised nature.

Blockchain Nodes

Blockchain is made up of computing nodes. But what exactly are these nodes and what do they do. Nodes are computers on the Blockchain via a client that executes the task of relaying and validating transactions. For instance, a computer linked with the Bitcoin Blockchain is referred to as a Bitcoin node.

Each node on the network is a blockchain administrator and it automatically receives a copy of the blockchain upon joining the network — which justifies the role of nodes. The arrangement of nodes is somewhat tree-like and it is referred to as binary trees.

Every single digital coin on the blockchain has its nodes that maintains it transaction records. Being a node on the blockchain network is rewarding as there are incentives for participants in the form of digital coins.

The main purpose of nodes is to preserve the authenticity, accuracy and integrity of the Blockchain for a peculiar purpose/field. With just a node running on the network in any place on the globe, the integrity of an entire Blockchain history can be ensured. This is one of the reasons why tokens or coins running on blockchains are extremely hack-proof and not susceptible to data loss or damage due to system crashes or power failure.

Regardless of the fact that one node will efficiently secure a blockchain history; there are hundreds of thousands of nodes running at any particular time. The increased number of nodes on a network increases the network efficiency as more tasks split will be enabled. Without nodes up and running, there will be no cryptographic blocks or even chains.

Types of Nodes

Generally, there are two major types of nodes namely full nodes and lightweight nodes.

Full nodes are saddled with the responsibility of archiving a comprehensive and complete blockchain ledger. Full nodes hold records of all transactions that has ever occurred on the blockchain, block headers, and also, new transactions. The problem with full nodes will however, begin when block sizes starts to grow.

Lightweight nodes, often referred to as partial nodes are a bit different from the full nodes. Partial nodes do not store the entire blockchain ledger rather, they utilise SPV (simplified payment verification) that only requires a part of the blockchain downloaded. Partial nodes connect to full nodes but to ensure they adhere strictly to their operations, they use bloom filters. Simply said, lightweight nodes don’t process huge data.

Either of these nodes can run on a private or public blockchain.

A private blockchain or permissioned blockchain is a network that requires permission or an invitation to join. In other words, there is a restriction on who can participate. Private nodes utilize variable access mechanism i.e. an organisation could serve licenses to intending participants on the network; the decision could be made by a consortium; or future entrants could be decided by existing participants on the network.

The major difference between a public and private network is ‘who participates, maintains distributed ledgers, and upholds the consensus algorithm.’ this type of network is entirely open to any intending participant from anywhere on the globe. Here an incentive-based mechanism is adopted to bring in more participants. A typical example of public blockchain network is Bitcoin and Ethereum also uses the same mode.

Working Independently

Private nodes can be a component of the private or public blockchain, depending on how they are participating. They are a set of well identified computers on the blockchain network that collectively process, record and verify transactions. You can become a node on the private or public network. A collection of private nodes will rather function as full nodes while a single private node will best function as a lightweight node, except if huge processing power is available.

If you are running a singular node on the blockchain network then you might choose to be a part of the public or private network depending on your processing power and the amount of data you can handle. In the case of a network of private nodes, say 3–4 computers, you will have to connect these private nodes to function as a unit.

You can achieve this using DNS queries, technically referred to as ‘DNS seeds.’ Each node connects to another using a call-back IP address obtained from DNS requests or hard coded addresses in the software.

Private nodes have a copy of the blockchain either completely or partially. And every time a transaction is initiated, they check to ascertain its validity, and if proven valid, they record such transaction into a block (data spreadsheet).

Private Chains Supports Chain Specialization

The aim is to connect all different networks into a blockchain but while blockchain may not be able to deal with all systems at once due to transparency and privacy concerns, Nerves Blockchain has been designed to do that with regards to these concerns.

On a single blockchain, the more the number of networks or systems, the faster it increases in size and computation. This increase will reduce performance and limit blockchain’s potential.

With a private chain devoted to a field of endeavor, higher efficiency levels are recorded. Each blockchain on Nerves Blockchain can interact independently with other blockchains of the different platform present without having issues. These small interactions through Task Specialization can form a large communication system which the system depends on for stability.

Nerves Blockchain has a distinct and revolutionary outlook to the performance and optimization of the network. Each private chain can run unhindered in such a way that efficiency, speed and security of the network is continually promoted and enhanced.