Tag: Proof-of-Work (PoW)

Proof-of-Work (PoW), a consensus algorithm that serves a dual purpose: validating transactions and creating new blocks within a blockchain. This term originated from Moni Naor and Cynthia Dwork in 1993, but it wasn’t until the advent of Bitcoin – a cryptocurrency brainchild of an individual or a group using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto – that the term began to gain traction.

The PoW protocol mandates the ‘miners’ or participants in the network to solve intricate mathematical puzzles or ‘problems’, thus validating the inclusion of a new block to the blockchain. These problems require substantial computational power to solve; hence, the ‘work’ in Proof-of-Work refers to the cumulative computational energy expended in deciphering these puzzles.