Recent Advances in Smart Contract and Blockchain Analysis
A special issue of Information (ISSN 2078-2489). This special issue belongs to the section "Information and Communications Technology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 April 2026 | Viewed by 5
Special Issue Editors
Interests: program analysis; abstract interpretation; blockchain; smart contracts; static analysis; formal methods
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Blockchain technologies and smart contracts are rapidly transforming a wide range of industries, from finance and supply chain management to gaming and digital identity. As decentralized systems grow in complexity and impact, ensuring their reliability, correctness, security, scalability, and regulatory compliance becomes increasingly crucial. This Special Issue aims to bring together cutting-edge research that addresses the theoretical foundations, practical applications, and tool development for analyzing and securing smart contracts and blockchain infrastructures.
We welcome original contributions that explore software engineering practices, formal methods, static and dynamic analysis, symbolic execution, formal verification, runtime monitoring, fuzzing techniques, AI-driven approaches applied to smart contracts, and decentralized applications (dApps). Topics of interest include (but are not limited to) the following:
- Vulnerability detection and mitigation;
- Gas optimization;
- Cross-chain interaction analysis;
- P-preserving computation;
- On-chain governance verification;
- Novel models of computation on distributed ledgers;
- Software engineering methodologies for the development, testing, deployment, and maintenance of blockchain-based systems;
- Design patterns and anti-patterns;
- Automated testing;
- Runtime monitoring;
- Secure programming languages and DSLs for smart contracts;
- Continuous integration;
- Contract upgradeability and maintainability of dApps.
This Issue also encourages submissions presenting innovative tools and frameworks, especially those that bridge the gap between theory and practical deployment, as well as surveys that synthesize the current landscape of smart contract analysis. Research on real-world contract datasets and reproducibility-focused research is particularly encouraged.
We look forward to receiving your contributions and to advancing our knowledge in this research area.
Dr. Vincenzo Arceri
Dr. Luca Olivieri
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Information is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- smart contract engineering
- blockchain security
- software engineering for dApps
- vulnerability detection
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