Research at the TU Wien Blockchain Hub
Talk by Georgia Avarikioti
Abstract: Blockchains have evolved from cryptocurrencies into a foundational infrastructure for secure, decentralized computation. At the Blockchain Hub of TU Wien, we study the principled design of blockchain systems across layers: from consensus protocols and cryptographic foundations to scalability, interoperability, and cryptoeconomics. We combine formal reasoning with real-world deployment, collaborating with industry to ensure that theory informs practice and vice versa.
This talk presents our research vision and outlines how students can contribute to shaping the next generation of decentralized infrastructures. I will also introduce the new TU Wien Blockchain Student Association (BSA), an initiative connecting bachelor and master students with researchers and industry practitioners through monthly events featuring invited talks and networking (with food and drinks). Our goal is to foster a vibrant local ecosystem bridging research, engineering, and entrepreneurship in blockchain technologies.
Bio: Georgia (Zeta) Avarikioti is an Assistant Professor at the Technical University of Vienna (TU Wien), where she leads the Blockchain Hub, within the university’s Cybersecurity Center. She holds a PhD from ETH Zürich, advised by Roger Wattenhofer, and has previously held research positions at IST Austria and Columbia University. She specializes in distributed systems, blockchain scalability and interoperability, and the analysis of cryptoeconomic incentives, with numerous publications spanning payment channels (e.g., Brick, Cerberus, Crab), light clients and bridges (e.g., Blink, Alba, Glimpse, BitVM), consensus protocols (e.g., FnF-BFT, CoBRA), as well as foundational work on sharding, layer 2 protocols, and compositional game theory. Her work has appeared at leading venues including USENIX Security, ACM CCS, NDSS, CSF, FC, AFT, AAAI, and SODA, and is supported by several major national funding bodies (FWF, WWTF) and industry-funded research donations (Ark Labs, Sui Foundation). She currently serves on the program committees of top-tier conferences such as CCS, USENIX Security, FC, and as Program Chair of the Advances in Financial Technologies (AFT 2025) conference. In 2025, she received the Hedy Lamarr Prize from the City of Vienna for her contributions to information technology, as well as the Bitcoin Research Prize, along with her collaborators, for their work on BitVM.