2026-04-01
Bhawana Tyagi, Naga Priyadarsini R, Priyadharsini M, Vimal Dwivedi
The vaccine of blockchain technology has quickly altered the processing, validation, and settlement of health insurance claims by bringing transparency, automation, and tamper-proof data exchange. The traditional insurance claims systems continue to suffer from fragmented workflows, inconsistent data standards and high risk of fraud. This paper provides a detailed survey of the issues currently affecting claim management and the increasing importance of blockchain as a trust-enhancing technology. The present advancements in healthcare insurance blockchain research are established through a review of current literature that identifies required research areas. To enhance understanding of frauds, we organize healthcare insurance fraud into a framework that shows different attack methods that tokenization can protect. The fundamental principles of blockchain and data tokenization as healthcare assets are explained which led to the development of a complex survey system that operates on blockchain-based tokenization platforms. The research identifies five essential elements which include smart contracts, identity tokens, claim tokens, off-chain medical data orchestration, and interoperability systems as the core subjects of the study. The paper presents its research findings about digital transformation advantages which include fraud reduction and automated adjudication and real-time tracking and increased participant trust. The paper establishes an essential discussion about multiple obstacles which include universal token standardization issues and privacy concerns and legal compliance requirements that create scalability and interoperability challenges. The survey not only covers the technology, operations and regulation, but it also points out the future of health insurance as being secure, fast and easily scalable through tokenization.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17683012026-03-26
Irene Domenicale, Cristina Toti, Cristina Viano
Blockchain technologies are increasingly explored as tools for strengthening local, collaborative economies, yet existing tokenomics models remain rooted in financial incentives and market-based logics. This paper advances an interdisciplinary approach to the analysis and design of socially embedded tokenized systems for local communities. Drawing from token engineering, economic sociology, monetary theory, and research on digital platforms, we develop a multidimensional framework that captures the social, governance, economic, and technological dimensions of tokenized circuits of commerce. Building on this framework, we introduce a participatory co-design methodology based on four phases, from contextual framing to socioeconomic modeling, mechanism design, and technical token specification. The method emphasizes the need for aligning token design with community values, non-market forms of integration, and the relational and situated nature of money and digital artifacts. It is complemented by a civic-oriented blockchain wallet that can be customized to support different tokenized systems. The applicability of this methodology is preliminarily evaluated through a case study in the food-waste recovery domain, conducted as part of a feasibility study for a tokenized redistribution system addressing social inclusion.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17583952026-03-23
Juan Manuel Sobral, Mario De los Santos, Martin Solari, Santiago Matalonga
Blockchain technology continues to promise transformative impact across domains such as supply chains, finance, and the Internet of Things (IoT). However, the rapid growth and increasing heterogeneity of blockchain platforms have made architectural decision-making progressively more complex for software architects. This study extends and updates a previous Multivocal Literature Review (MLR) to systematically identify and characterize active blockchain networks across foundational protocol layers. We analyze key architectural dimensions including consensus mechanisms, decentralization and access control models, smart contract support, block and ledger structures, interoperability features, and architectural lineage. Drawing on both academic and gray literature, we characterize a total of 147 blockchain networks spanning Layers-0 through-2. Our findings reveal an ecosystem largely driven by industrial innovation, with limited consolidation in the formal academic literature. The resulting architectural mappings aim to support software architects in making informed, evidence-based decisions when integrating blockchain technologies into software-intensive systems.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17815392026-03-18
Zishan Ashraf Mohammad, Joachim Bauer
This study identifies major approaches in token design for founders in the cryptocurrency/web3/blockchain space. The high failure rate of blockchain companies means that successful long-term performance will depend greatly on well-designed tokens. This study will integrate all prior research to highlight the most important aspects of structured tokenomics, including token utility, governance, and security. The study also contributes to the literature by introducing the Business Model Canvas as a conceptual framework that enables the integration of best practices for token design, drawing on both academic and industry literature. The results indicate significant gaps in the literature. This study offers new and practical insights for founders to enhance stakeholders’ engagement, improve regulatory compliance, and ensure project viability in the volatile cryptocurrency market. Furthermore, this research generates new knowledge that bridges the gap between the theory and practice of tokenomics, laying the groundwork for future research to develop and refine token design strategies.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17417562026-03-12
Lukas Stopfer, Eugen Buss, Alexander Kaulen, Ferréol Berendt, Felipe De Miguel, Marcel Püls, Stefan Lier, Mirella Elias, Stelian Alexandru Borz, Marc Hanewinkel, Thomas Purfürst
This study quantifies the energy use, carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) emissions, and transaction-related costs of distributed ledger technologies (DLTs) in the context of timber traceability. It combines: (i) a PRISMA-guided systematic review of empirical studies on DLT energy consumption; and (ii) benchmark values derived from continuously updated online monitoring sources, captured at defined access dates and fully documented in the . Comparable metrics are reported at the level of individual traceability events (kWh/tx, gCO2e/tx, and USD/tx) and are related to a realistic timber supply chain transaction model that was empirically validated in a pilot study. The results reveal substantial differences in sustainability performance across consensus mechanisms. Proof-of-Work (PoW) networks exhibit prohibitively high energy demand and CO2e emissions for frequent traceability notarizations. In contrast, Proof-of-Stake (PoS), PBFT-based, hybrid, and Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) architectures enable low-energy and low-cost event logging. This study bridges the gap between established DLT sustainability research and the operational requirements of regulated forestry traceability by providing a transparent and reproducible benchmarking workflow that includes URLs, access dates and calculation spreadsheets.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17452002026-02-18
Prabhavathi Jayaraman, Radhakrishnan Delhibabu
IntroductionIn the contemporary digital health landscape, securing personal health data against unauthorized access while ensuring its verifiability is a paramount challenge. A critical conflict exists between the transparency required for data verification and the privacy mandated by global regulations such as HIPAA and GDPR. Existing Layer-1 blockchain solutions suffer from prohibitive gas costs and high latency, rendering them unsuitable for real-time monitoring of high-volume health data streams.MethodsThis paper proposes TeleZK-L2, a novel framework that synergizes distributed Zero-Knowledge Succinct Non-Interactive Arguments of Knowledge (zk-SNARKs) with Layer-2 scaling solutions. The architecture introduces a Distributed Prover Network (DPN) to parallelize heavy cryptographic computations and utilizes Optimistic Proof Aggregation to minimize on-chain data footprints. The verification logic is anchored on the Polygon zkEVM to ensure high throughput and low-cost settlement.ResultsExtensive simulations on a 16-node high-performance cluster demonstrate that TeleZK-L2 generates proofs at a rate 40% faster than the standard Groth16 baseline. Furthermore, the framework reduces on-chain verification costs by approximately 52%. The system maintains constant-time verification complexity regardless of batch size, achieving a peak throughput of 260 TPS.DiscussionTeleZK-L2 provides the technical privacy guarantees necessary to support adherence to HIPAA and GDPR data minimization mandates while maintaining cryptographic soundness. By resolving the "Scalability-Privacy Trilemma," this framework demonstrates significant potential for large-scale deployment in national telehealth infrastructures and remote patient monitoring ecosystems.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17627812026-02-16
Mohammed El-Hajj
Digital Twins are becoming essential for optimizing decentralized systems through real-time data processing and off-chain analytics. However, existing solutions often face challenges such as high latency, limited scalability, and weak synchronization between physical and virtual entities. This study introduces a novel framework that integrates DTs with blockchain to enhance off-chain processing efficiency while preserving security and data integrity. Using IoT sensor data and a test environment built with Ganache, Flask, and Python-based optimization models, the proposed system achieved throughput levels of up to 500 transactions per second and reduced latency by 50% compared to a traditional baseline, with processing times consistently under 150 m. It maintained a transaction success rate above 90% under moderate load (30–40 concurrent Digital Twins) and approximately 70% with 100 concurrent Digital Twins under high-stress conditions. The framework also demonstrated strong resource efficiency, averaging 50% CPU and 40% memory usage, while reducing energy consumption by 33%–41% across low, moderate, and high load scenarios. A comprehensive cost-effectiveness analysis revealed a 35.2% reduction in total cost of ownership (TCO) over a 3-year period, with a return on investment (ROI) of 140%. Security assessments confirmed resilience against common attack vectors. These results highlight the system’s potential as a scalable, secure, energy-efficient, and economically viable solution for decentralized applications in smart cities and industrial IoT environments.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.17196222026-02-10
Manisha Sanghvi, Prashant Ubarhande, Arti Chandani, Mohit Pathak, Smita Wagholikar, Sonali Bagade, Rizwana Atiq
IntroductionTechnological advances, such as blockchain, have revolutionized the finance sector by providing a secure, transparent, and efficient system for transactions.MethodsThe present study utilized the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) method to analyse 2,401 scholarly pieces using Python, to explore the research areas in the domain of finance.ResultsThe results of the study show 15 important topics in blockchain and finance. Later, these topics were grouped into five clusters to identify future research avenues. We have also proposed research questions under each cluster aimed at filling the research gap.DiscussionThe study offers suggestions to future researchers by uncovering the existing gaps in the body of knowledge in blockchain in finance, along with documenting the emerging trends in the domain of finance.
DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2026.1730387