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It's my humble pleasure to participate in this week's lecture of the Mimblewimble Blockchain system. I'm also grateful to professor @fredquantum for the pretty privilege of going through this reserch, thanks and below is my take to your questions.

1. In detail, explain your understanding of the Mimblewimble protocol.

The Mimblewimble Coin was invented by Tom Elvis In 2016 but was fully announced in February 2019 as it endorsed it's first airdrop to holders of Bitcoin. Nevertheless, the mainnet was launched in the month of November 2019 creating a 10 million MWC in it's Genesis block.

This innovation was invented to mitigate against certain challenges faced by the Bitcoin which includes deficiency in the provision of network scalability, deficiency in fungibility and more especially the privacy upheaval.

THE MIMBLEWIMBLE PROTOCOL PROPER:
This is a protocol in the Mimblewimble invention which permits for a more efficient transaction, like the storage of data for exquisitely enhanced privacy and scalability option as compared to some other blockchains that are weighed down with such option. Nevertheless let's go through these processes in detail;

1- ENHANCED PRIVACY OPTION:

The Mimblewimble protocol has enhanced the issue of privacy and anonymity which is an Achilles heel to many other Blockchain like the Bitcoin and Ethereum blockchain amongst others.
In the Bitcoin blockchain for instance it is easy to track different transaction of users and know when they were able to add some block to the Blockchain.
But on the contrary, the Mimblewimble has brought a tremendous change in extirpating the privacy issues faced by many blockchains. For instance the Mimblewimble disposes the output of people's transactions as a single output which makes it difficult to identify transaction performed by individuals in its blockchain.

2- IMPROVED SCALABILITY MEASURES:

This has been a major threat to The blockchain technology as it also has been mitigated by this innovation.
Nevertheless scalability which is the limitation that most blockchain like Bitcoin and other Blockchain encounters in order to process large transactions due to limited block size and large information that is being processed at a particular time which malignantly has affected the fees of authenticating transactions in them has been curtailed by this innovation of Mimblewimble.

FUNGIBILITY:

This is another great future on the Mimblewimble which permits it to be easily substituted or exchanged with any crypto coin at all because of its privacy option. We know that there are many exchanges that may not permit the transfer of cryptocurrencies to certain platforms but this is not the case in this invention, as you can transfer or substitute any cryptocurrency at all because of it anonymous measure.

CRYPTOGRAPHIC PROTOCOL:

Like every other Blockchain has it's distinct algorithmic protocol so applies to this invention as it uses the elliptic curve cryptography which is an approach to public keys cryptography that was invention by Neal Koblitz and Victor Miller in 1984 in which it is being manipulated upon to assign private keys to users transactions in Mimblewimble that is it is meant to protect internal transactions within the Blockchain, although this is not the only cryptographic protocol being used in the Mimblewimble as they also combine cryptographic protocols like confidence transaction and coinjoin.

2 Discuss in detail how the Mimblewimble blockchain protocol works.

First before going into detail on how the protocol in Mimblewimble works we must first notes these two eminent scenarios which are:

1- Redundancies or excess information are not stored as they are eliminated from the Mimblewimble blockchain because of its small block size as compared to the Bitcoin or ethereum block size.

2- The Mimblewimble operate on a full scale of anonymity and privacy which seclude the disposal of information from the mimblewimble blockchain.

Now taking into account how this protocol works;
We know that Mimblewimble is built on a very high demanding privacy option which includes confidence transaction and coinjoin that helps in authenticating anonymity and privacy of a transaction.

Next a sender and a receiver comes into terms by exchanging valid information and the amount to be transferred.

Now the two parties who has come in agreement to authenticate this transaction after they have exchanged they are valued information the sender now releases the assets which now drops in the receivers wallet. Nevertheless unlike monero which operate on a full scale of anonymity likewise this innovation functions as the coin join and confidence transaction protects or shields the identities of individuals at stake.

Let's take a little example below:

Source

From the screenshot above, it is obvious that all the blocks has no specification of where actually the transaction came from or who performed it but rather we can only see the blocks that were added into their block explorer which is a very serious annotation of privacy and anonymity, authenticating the confidence transaction protocol of the Mimblewimble Blockchain.

Source

We can also see that from this second block option that i isolated which is the most current block that was added as of the time I was making this post with figure 946488, there is no transaction option which is a clear proof of anonymity and absolute privacy.

3 Discuss in detail your understanding of Confidential Transactions (CTs).

This is an option in Blockchain technology that was created for the enhancement of privacy. This idea was posited by the current blockstream president, Dr Adam Black in 2013 of which Gregory Maxwell, Dr. Pieter Wuille and Andrew Poelstra a blockstream mathematician picked interest upon.

Nevertheless this uses different cryptographic tricks more obviously the Pedersen commitment schemes and borromean ring signature which is all geared towards providing anonymity.

By definition, we can also say that it is a cryptographic protocol that result to the amount all value of an encrypted transaction within the blockchain technology. To this extent having known what confidential transaction is, let's now investigate on how to use it.

THE APPLICATION OF CONFIDENTIAL TRANSACTION

Let's assume two uses Dav and Chi wishes to make transaction and perhaps it is Dav that will be transferring to Chi on the mimblewimble platform, so Dave must spend all of his Unspent Transactionary Output (UTXO) if he has more than what Chi requires from him then exit and go through the process of sending the remnant back to himself.

Let's now bring it to practical terms, let's still assume that Dave has 10 GRIN which is the mimblewimble coin to Chi but Dave has a total of 20 Grin, so he will spend all the 20 Green but sending 10 to Chi after which he remit back the 10 to his wallet.

THE INVOLVEMENT OF CONFIDENTIAL TRANSACTION:

Let's go through certain confidential transaction commitment which will help us to have a more in-depth knowledge about this transaction.

1- this system was created to improve the privacy option of crypto blockchain technology

2- it allows for certain information in which the involved parties can easily access and read without much upheaval

3- It is impossible for a third party to understand what that has transpired between the two parties that has already transacted so the third party can only access encrypted information which he or she cannot decrypt or understand

4- a third party can only agree to the fact that transaction has been authenticated given the encrypted information or message that is disposed to him but he cannot actually ascertain who and what kind of transaction that was undertaken.

FORMULA FOR CONFIDENTIAL TRANSACTION:

I agree to the fact that there are many formulas or possibly there could be many formulas in solving the confidential transaction but I was disposed to this, so let's go through this method of solving the confidential transaction below.

C ( BF1 + D1 ) + C ( BF2 + D2 )

=C ( BF1 + BF2, D1 + D2 )

DESCRIPTION OF VARIABLES:

BF is the random data

D is the transactional data

C ( BF1 + D1 ) this is the direction of change

C ( BF2 + B2 ) this is the address of the receiver

C ( BF1 + BF2, D1 + D2 ) this is the origin of the fund.

4 How do you think Mimblewimble Protocol can be utilized on the Bitcoin Network to enable anonymity of transactions and improve scalability?

I believe there are still tremendous ways through which the application of the Mimblewimble can applied to enhance the issue of privacy in the Bitcoin network, but on the other hand, I'll be majoring on the deployment of the confidence transaction in conjunction with the blind signature in mitigating against the issue of privacy in the Bitcoin network.

First what is the blind signature ( invented by David Chaum)

This is a digital signature that disguises the content of a message before is signed.
This process is actually a very good privacy protocol which distinguishes the signer and the author of a message. This method can be deployed in a cash management system or a cryptographic election which provides unlinkability to users.
Now let's illustrate how this works:
First it is agreeable that this process involves two parties let's assume Dav and Chi

Next the deployment of blinded signature is now effected where Dav sent a message to Chi this can be viewed subject to verification by Chi in a code familiar to Chi of which without it, the message can't be accessed or useful.

Application of confidence transaction for a better enhancement of privacy in the Bitcoin network.

Confidence transaction protocol which is also similar to the concept of blind signature can also be used to enhance privacy in the Bitcoin network. We know that the issue of redundancies or excess information is extirpated from the Mimblewimble platform as well as privacy enhancement, a core goal in it's invention.
Finally the deployment of confidence transaction on the Bitcoin network will effect a great deal of change in its privacy option.

5 State the Pros and Cons of the Mimblewimble protocol.

Although the Mimblewimble is a great innovation that has a great deal of advantages although not without disadvantages, so I'll be expanciating them below.

PROS OF MIMBLEWIMBLE:

Magnanimous advantage of this blockchain cannot be extirpated, so let's go through a few of its advantages below.

1- ANONYMITY

This system is highly exceptional in shielding the transaction of its users from public view. Unlock the Bitcoin and many other networks whose transaction is open to the public, contrarily this system is secluded from such option.

2- SCALABILITY:

The Mimblewimble's option of scalability is very encouraging compared to the BTC my most other blockchains, since this systems block size a smaller compared to the sizes of most blockchains it gives it a good advantage of scalability.

3- REDUNDANCY:

we know that this system does not have a very large block size and for this it discourages the storage of excess and irrelevant information which which could pile up on its block, therefore giving it a very great advantage over many other blockchain.

4- FUNGIBILITY:

The system is highly Fungible in that you can substitute any kind of your choice in it as compared to most other exchanges and block chains that certain coins cannot be substituted.

CONS OF MIMBLEWIMBLE:

This system, despite it's magnanimous advantage isn't without some deficiencies which are also malignant to it, so let's go through a few of it below.

1- VULNERABLE TO ATTACK:

Since the Mimblewimble relies on dignity signatures it makes it prone to attack that probably are carried out using quantum computers.

2- LOWER OUTPUT OF TRANSACTION:

The case of confidential transaction that is associated with the Mimblewimble makes it to encounter slowed transaction output which is actually a disadvantage on it's part.

6 Discuss in detail at least a Crypto that uses the Mimblewimble protocol.

I will be discussing the Grin crypto coin in this regard.

The Grin coin which is based on the privacy cryptocurrency and was built on the Mimblewimble platform published it's white paper officially in 15th of Jan. 2019.

This invention was named after Harry Potter book series. This tries to merge transactions together in a way they are inseparable even while on the public ledger.

Grin seeks to fill the gap that exist in private and lightweight Mimblewimble protocol as to ascertain an exquisitely functional Grin crypto Blockchain.

BASIC FEATURES OF THE GRIN COIN

1- Grin works on Cockoo cycle as it uses both proof of work algorithm and PoW and ASIC.

2- Main Grin operates in Rust.

3- It discourages hoarding as it has an infinite and constant supply.

4- It is main to be a usable currency.

5- It is a coin that is maint to restore GPU mining as it is recommended for miners to use a GPU of about 3.7GB that has a fast Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM)

CURRENT ANALYSIS OF GRIN

1- The current price of Grin to USD = 0.34

2- Market capitalization= $ 28,772,,177.29

3- Trading volume= $ 2,595,087.99

4- Market ranking of #669

This information as of the time of filling this report was obtained from source

CONCLUSION

The Mimblewimble innovation is an invention that has brought tremendous mutation to the Blockchain technology, as it has been able to skunk certain upheavals bedeviling the invention like privacy, scalability, fungibility amongst others.

I trust that the deployment of this inventions protocol on other Blockchain like the Bitcoin,Ethereum etc will aid anonymity and also assist in keeping their Blockchain highly secured while also improving their scalability and fungibility limitation.

Thanks for patiently going through.

Cc: @fredquantum