Work

MEC-Chain: Towards a New Framework for a MEC-Enabled Mobile Blockchain Network Under the PoS Consensus

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: The Proof of Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism is increasingly used in blockchain systems; however, resource allocation for PoS-based mobile blockchain networks remains underexplored, particularly given the constraints of mobile devices. This work introduces MEC-Chain, a new framework that integrates Mobile Edge Computing (MEC) with mobile blockchain to support efficient validator-node execution under PoS. MEC-Chain formalizes a multi-objective resource-allocation problem that jointly considers latency, reliability, and cost from both the validator and MEC-provider perspectives. To address this challenge, we develop a deep reinforcement learning-based allocation agent using the Proximal Policy Optimization (PPO) algorithm. Experimental results show that PPO achieves a 30–40% reduction in total execution time, 25–35% lower transmission latency, and 10–15% higher reliability compared to A2C (Advantage Actor–Critic) and DQN (Deep Q-Network), while offering comparable cost savings across all methods. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of MEC-Chain in enabling low-latency, reliable, and resource-efficient PoS validation within mobile blockchain environments.

Source: Future Internet

DOI: 10.3390/fi17120563

Authors: Rima Grati, Khouloud Boukadi, Safa Elleuch

Institutions: Zayed University, University of Sfax, Faculty of Economics and Management of Sfax

Language: English

Topic: Blockchain Technology Applications and Security

Subfield: Information Systems

Field: Computer Science

Domain: Physical Sciences

SDG: Industry, innovation and infrastructure

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $1,930