A family of provably secure proof-of-stake consensus protocols that divide time into epochs and slots and select block producers in proportion to stake.
Semantic Classification
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- Ouroboros structures time into epochs subdivided into slots, with a leader chosen for each slot using a stake-weighted random selection. The protocol comes with formal security proofs relating its safety to assumptions about honest stake.
- It is the consensus protocol used by Cardano and has been extended through several versions to improve decentralisation and resistance to adversaries. Randomness for leader election is derived in a verifiable way to limit manipulation.