Nois is a unique blockchain protocol engineered to facilitate secure, unbiased, and cost-effective randomness within the expansive web3 domain. Through a blend of innovative blockchain design and integration with the drand protocol, Nois emerges as a pivotal infrastructure layer in the blockchain ecosystem, especially within the Cosmos network, enhancing the fairness, security, and unpredictability of decentralized applications.
Overview
Launched on March 28, 2023, the Nois network is a Proof of Stake (PoS) blockchain protocol that endeavors to furnish the Cosmos ecosystem with a reliable entropy source. By disseminating randomness in the form of random beacons to other Cosmos SDK blockchains via Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC), Nois augments the operational integrity and fairness of various blockchain-based applications and systems.
Technical Framework
The Nois protocol operates through a sequence of orchestrated interactions involving smart contracts on IBC-enabled chains and a network of bots on the Nois Network. These steps culminate in the generation and verification of randomness, which is then made available to the requesting decentralized applications (dApps). Drand protocol serves as the bedrock of Nois’s randomness generation, ensuring the randomness is secure, unbiased, and unpredictable.
Randomness Generation and Verification
The process commences with a contract on an IBC-enabled chain sending a message to a Nois proxy contract. The proxy contract then relays an IBC message to its counterpart on the Nois Network, cueing the job in a queue. Upon the release of the drand beacon for the correct round, a network of bots dispatches it to the Nois Network for verification, which, upon successful verification, processes the pending jobs and sends the beacon back to the proxy contract.
Utility and Use Cases
Nois’s core utility lies in its provision of decentralized unbiased randomness, which is indispensable in a myriad of applications like lotteries, financial systems, voting processes, cybersecurity, and encryption. By offering a secure and reliable source of randomness, Nois bolsters the fairness and security of these applications, thereby enhancing user trust and experience.
Staking and Network Participation
Participants can stake $NOIS to secure the network and earn rewards, with the staking process facilitated through various web tools or CLI tools within the Cosmos ecosystem. Unstaking $NOIS entails an unbonding period during which no rewards are distributed.
