Scientific research information management based on blockchain technology

2.1. Blockchain technology definition and characteristics

In recent years, the application of blockchain technology has shown explosive growth, which is considered to be a subversive innovation after Internet and the mobile/social networks. Blockchain technology is the prototype of the next generation of cloud computing. It is expected to completely reshape human social activities like Internet, and achieve the transformation from the current information Internet to the value Internet. Blockchain technology was summarized in 2008 by a digital currency – Bitcoin [5]. At present, the concept of blockchain has not yet formed a definition recognized by the industry, but some basic agreements have been reached. Blockchain technology is a brand-new use of encrypted chain block structure in the storage structure, using distributed node consensus algorithm to generate and update data, and a flexible scripting system (smart contract) to program and manipulate data decentralized infrastructure and distributed computing paradigm [15]. Figure 1 gives the basic structure and shows the data record distributed in each data block. It is essentially a distributed record or distributed public ledger database of transactions or digital events that all transaction participants have executed and shared [6]. Every transaction in the public ledger is verified by the consensus of most participants in the system, and once the transaction information is completed, the information will always exist, that is, the blockchain contains a verifiable record of every transaction.

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Fig. 1.

The basic structure of blockchain.

Further, the basic structure of blockchain technology is shown in Fig. 2 [18], including core technology components, core application components and supporting facilities. In the core technology components, there are communication layer, storage layer, security mechanism layer and consensus mechanism layer. Usually the blockchain technology has the following characteristics:

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Fig. 2.

The technology architecture of blockchain.

As a new technology, the blockchain also faces various problems and obstacles that restrict its development. There are currently two prominent problems. One is the resource problem, that the blockchain relies on encryption to provide security and establish consensus on a distributed network. This means that in order to prove users have the right to write to the chain, complex algorithms must be run, and a large amount of computing power is required and highly dependent, but these computing powers do not produce any actual value. The second problem is the regulatory issue. The decentralization of the blockchain can avoid many problems in the structure of the traditional centralized economic system, but it also means that the subject is not clear and is difficult to effectively control the subject.

The most well-known example of the application of blockchain technology is Bitcoin, that was first born in 2008. An individual or group aliased as “Satoshi Nakamoto” published a paper entitled “Bitcoin: A Peer-To-Peer Electronic Cash System” [10], which described the concept and model of peer-to-peer transactions in electronic cash, that is, sending directly from one party to another without paying online through the third-party financial institutions. As we all know, Bitcoin implemented this concept for the first time. At present, cryptocurrency is commonly used to describe all networks and transaction media that use passwords to guarantee transactions, which is completely different from the traditional transactions implemented through the third-party central trust mechanisms. As an Internet protocol, without the existence of intermediary organizations, Bitcoin can transfer value between each other instantly and safely, such as credit third parties, thereby reducing the transaction costs and improving the transaction efficiency.

Literally, the blockchain is a distributed ledger system consisting of a series of data blocks generated using cryptographic methods. Each data block contains a large amount of transaction information to verify the validity of information and generate the next block. These blocks are arranged in the order of generation, where each block is a node. The distinguishing feature of the blockchain is that there is no third-party supervision as a central server, and the transaction information in the block cannot be changed. The Merkel tree can be used in the blockchain to verify whether the data has been damaged [9]. The Merkel tree is a tree-shaped data structure based on Hash algorithm, where each non-leaf node is the Hash value of the leaf node, as shown in Fig. 3. From the bottom to the top in the Meekel tree, two node hashes are connected, and the combined hash is used as the new hash. Then, the new hash becomes the new tree node. Repeat this process until there is only one node, which is the root of the tree. The root hash will be regarded as the only indication of the entire block transaction, and it can be used for proof of work by storing it in the block header. The advantage of the Merkle tree is that a single node can verify whether a certain transaction is included without downloading the entire block.

The information contained in the block can be a financial transaction or any other digital transaction, including documents. Bitcoin uses encrypted proofs instead of crediting the third-party, so that all parties willing to trade can complete the online transactions. Each transaction can be protected by a digital signature and sent to the “public key” of the recipient which is digitally signed using the “private key” of sender. Further, the owner of cryptocurrency needs to prove the ownership of “private key” to consume and trade online. Every transaction is broadcast to every node in the bitcoin network and recorded in the public ledger after verification. In addition, before each transaction is recorded in the public ledger, it needs to be validated. Therefore, two important things need to be ensured for verification node before recording each transaction: (1) Consumers have signature certification for their encrypted electronic money; (2) Sufficient encrypted electronic money in consumer accounts.

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Fig. 3.

The basic structure of Merkel tree.

Although the advanced applications are mainly concentrated in Bitcoin, the blockchain technology has excellent features such as anti-tampering, non-repudiation, time series data and collective maintenance. Especially, the decentralized nature of its peer-to-peer network has made it widely explored and applied in various fields of finance [14], economy and currency, for example cryptocurrency [7], distributed ledgers [16], document management, asset registration [17], inventory compilation, value exchange, initial coin offe(ICO) [4] and crowdfunding [1], charity, etc.

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Fig. 4.

The application of blockchain technology in various fields.

Owing to the characteristics of distributed storage, decentralization, high security and privacy protection, the blockchain technology is particularly suitable for storing and protecting the private data. Specifically, any data can be recorded into the blockchain using hash calculations by recording transactions, where the security is guaranteed by the computing power of the system consensus nodes and asymmetric encryption technology. As shown in Fig. 4, nowadays the blockchain technology is widely used to store personal health data, such as electronic medical records, genetic data, etc. In addition, the timestamps jointly verified and recorded by consensus nodes are non-tamperable, which makes the blockchain technology widely applicable to various data notarization and auditing scenarios. In a similar way, the blockchain technology is also widely adopted in the asset management industry. Due to the immutable modification of time stamps, blockchain can realize the confirmation, authorization and monitoring of the tangible and intangible assets. Morever, the voting system is a representative application of blockchain technology in the field of political affairs. The distributed consensus verification strategy is helpful for the political elections and corporate shareholder voting.

Except that, the blockchain technology will also become an effective way to solve the integrity problem in scientific research project management, and provide another theoretical perspective and technical support for the construction of scientific research integrity system.

For scientific research information management, the scientific research materials and data need to be maintained promptly, while the written materials such as papers and applications require a unique logo to prevent plagiarism. These requirements determine that the blockchain technology can be used to improve the information management system. As a type of data storage and management mode, blockchain can be easily combined with information management. The next section will discuss the innovation and application that the blockchain technology used in our scientific research management.

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Fig. 5.

The improvement and structure of the main links.

3.1. Data original protection and fraud governance

As we all know, the work carried out in the early stage of the scientific research project and the academic achievements are important indicators for evaluating the applicant’s scientific research capabilities and whether they can complete the applied project. A high-quality application is usually the key to the successful project application. Therefore, when applying for projects, there are often cases that the early-stage results are forged in the application. The applicant regards other people’s achievements as papers as his own. Common academic misconducts mainly include plagiarizing others’ successful applications or applications being applied, or even asking others to write applications on their behalf, and tampering with academic achievements that have been obtained: (1) Taking other people’s achievements, such as papers, as their achievements; (2) Chinese papers are listed in the form of English papers to disguise as English papers; (3) Changing the ranking relationship of papers, improving the applicant’s ranking, and even adding his name to the author information of published papers; (4) Fabricating other relevant information of the paper, such as changing the magazine name of the published paper, or even fabricating a paper which never be published. These behaviors have greatly damaged other applicants of scientific research projects, and have greatly damaged the innovation of scientific research.

At present, the development of academic misconduct detection tools is changing rapidly, which has been able to provide double-checking for scientific research project applications. However, the plagiarism and fraud of original ideas are more concealed than ordinary plagiarism. Moreover, most of the existing double-checking detection software can only detect the repetition rate of the text, and cannot effectively distinguish the plagiarism and data fraud on the content. Even analysis and judgment of non-text formats such as pictures and formulas are powerless. The storage of project applications in the blockchain mode can greatly improve the defects of existing digital applications, such as data traceability and data authenticity. Firstly, the blockchain will create a comprehensive and accurate digital identity information for each applicant, and will record each project application, as well as the results obtained. Above these, the applicant’s research trajectory will be established in a time series manner to form a comprehensive scientific research chain, which can record the work done by the applicant such as published results and academic exchange records clearly and accurately. Therefore, the blockchain technology will stamp each piece of information with a unique, tamper-proof digital certificate through its ledger function. The proven content can be described in any format, such as text, pictures, formulas, etc. The above method proves that the blockchain can build a universal project application database, which can provide a common standard for project applications. Any application materials uploaded to the blockchain will record their information and other relevant information in the ledger. During the application and review process of the project, the application platform built on the blockchain technology will be able to track the usage of the content. Once it is found to be used, the application platform can quickly trace and determine the original creator of its content through its account information. So, any plagiarism will be discovered quickly.

3.2. Scientific research project conclusion evaluation

The number and the level of publication have always been the criteria for evaluating whether a scientific research project can be completed. But the scientific research always has unforeseen risks, with great uncertainty. It is normal for the research planned in the application fail to reach the expected goal due to unknown and irresistible reasons, or to obtain a result that is not the project content planned in the application. Seeking truth from the facts reflects the respect for the spirit of science. Therefore, the contents of the application for scientific research projects can be divided into the following situations.

The research results are in accordance with the contents planned in the application. Especially in the case of designing a project with a high degree of innovation, it can achieve the intended purpose, which is the most ideal situation and should be affirmed.

3.3. Peer review

In the process of subject management, peer review mainly exists in the project application and project conclusion. The disadvantages of the peer review system for the current existing project applications are mainly reflected in four aspects: (1) The direction of the review project and the review experts are inconsistent. Due to the limitation of the number of project review experts, there are problems such as subjectivity, the limited ability to review, and deviation from the real needs of scientific research. (2) Since the results of the peer review are not published, it may lead to irresponsibility, abuse of rights, and prejudice among project review experts. (3) The reasons for the plagiarism in the project application include the review experts themselves or helping the project applicants who are familiar with them to plagiarize. This will bring losses to the original creators, and even bring great obstacles to academic innovation. (4) If the project review expert is familiar with the project applicant, it may be passed regardless of the content quality. In the acceptance of the conclusion of scientific research projects, there are also the same criticism and disadvantages of project applications. Anonymity has become the main controversy faced by the current review method, allowing anonymity to easily lead to irresponsible negative evaluations, but the implementation of mandatory real-name will suppress doubts about research results.

This paper believes that the blockchain technology can improve the quality of review by providing a distributed project review platform for scientific research projects. Under the blockchain platform, anonymous public comment with identity authentication and credit guarantee will be more easily realized. First, the scientific research project management system built on the blockchain model can create the accurate digital identity information for each review expert, including academic qualifications, units, job titles, academic achievements, etc. It is conducive to the implementation of more strict evaluation rules that carrying out identity authentication to determine whether it has the evaluation qualifications established by the scientific research project management system [9]. Secondly, in the verification process, the real information of the reviewing experts cannot be publicly obtained, which ensures that their privacy is protected and is conducive to making decisive comments. Thirdly, all project applicants can respond and score each review opinion, and the system can trace the review opinions, so that the review experts are strictly responsible for the review in an anonymous state, and unfriendly comments will be effectively contained. Obviously, blockchain has the ability to keep records permanently, which can make the credibility of the implementer be affected for life. Therefore, in the blockchain mode, the quality of peer review can be improved vidently.