Load balancing in blockchain environments

Inventors

Snow, Paul

Assignees

Inveniam Capital Partners Inc

Abstract

Hardware and software resources are load balanced when processing multiple blockchains. As more and more entities (whether public or private) are expected to generate their own blockchains for verification, a server or other resource in a blockchain environment may be over utilized. For example, as banks, websites, and retailers issue their own private cryptocoinage, the number of financial transactions may clog or hog networking and/or hardware resources. A blockchain load balancing mechanism thus allocates resources among the multiple blockchains.

Core Innovation

The invention relates to a blockchain load-balancing system in which a data layer server receives multiple private blockchains as inputs. The server identifies a virtual machine of a plurality of virtual machines by querying an electronic database using blockchain parameters including a parameter associated with a corresponding blockchain, and load balances the plurality of virtual machines to the plurality of blockchains by assigning the virtual machine to the corresponding blockchain using a blockchain load balancing mechanism.

The electronic database electronically associates the virtual machines to blockchain parameters, including a blockchain identifier such as a chain ID, and resource shares. The load balancing mechanism allocates and/or prioritizes processing by evaluating blockchain processing requirements using load parameters such as financial transaction rate, number of transactions, bit rate, processing time, or calendar-based preferential processing, and processing fee priority can also be included as part of the load parameters for processing assignment decisions.

The system supports dynamic re-evaluation in which assignments are updated based on timing parameters associated with dynamic re-evaluation. In addition, the system includes generating a blockchain data layer that records the blockchain load balancing mechanism assigning the virtual machine to the corresponding blockchain, and the documented blockchain data layer publication includes cryptographic hashing and public blockchain publication, including cryptographic proofs such as a Merkle proof.

Claims Coverage

The independent claims cover three aspects of the same core approach: a server-executed method for VM-to-blockchain load balancing, a server system implementing the same operations, and a memory device storing instructions implementing the operations while also generating a blockchain data layer that records the assignments. Across the independent claims, the inventive features include receiving multiple blockchains, identifying a VM via an electronic database associated with blockchain parameters, assigning the VM to a corresponding blockchain via a blockchain load balancing mechanism, and sending the selected blockchain to the VM for processing, with one independent claim additionally requiring recording the assignments in a blockchain data layer.

Across the independent claims, the coverage centers on a blockchain load balancing mechanism that uses an electronic database associating virtual machines with blockchain parameters to assign virtual machines to corresponding blockchains, then sends the selected blockchain to the virtual machine for processing; the third independent claim further requires generating a blockchain data layer that records the assignment.

Stated Advantages

Documented Applications

No documented applications found