Good news for cryptocurrency: scientists at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust (SnT) of the University of Luxembourg have created “Equihash”, a new mathematical algorithm that is a core component for the new cryptocurrency Zcash. Zcach is a decentralized and open-source cryptocurrency created by the Zcash Electric Coin Company (ZECC). The cryptocurrency that came into operation in late 2016, offers more privacy and equality than Bitcoin.
Zcash can be seen as an update to Bitcoin and its protocols, as it’s trying to resolve two main issues with Bitcoin: lack of privacy for transactions and “unfair” centralization, which refers to the centralization of transaction verification for only dozens of miners who have invested in expensive specialized mining hardware. This problem occurs because of the bitcoin mining algorithm that splits mining into many different small tasks and is not suited to standard hardware. Because of this, Bitcoin mining has to be done on expensive supercomputers that need to be located in places with cheap electricity and cooling.
But the new algorithm – Equihash – can resolve this problem. This algorithm doesn’t allow the “splitting”; instead, it allows efficient calculation on standard PCs. “If 10,000 miners with a single PC were active, in Zcash the investment to compete with them would be 10,000 times the price of a PC, while with bitcoin, the investment would be significantly smaller,” explained Dr. Dmitry Khovratovich at SnT. This means that the new algorithm enables Zcash to offer more equality, making it a more democratic digital currency.
Reference:
University of Luxembourg (http://wwwen.uni.lu/university/news/latest_news/towards_equal_access_to_digital_coins)
The Wonderful World of Algorithms 