Blockchain is an emerging technology that has already enabled a wide range of applications, from cryptocurrencies to digital asset management to supply chains. Due to this surge of popularity, analyzing the data stored on blockchains transpires as a new critical challenge in data science. To assist data scientists in various analytic tasks on a blockchain, we provide a systematic and comprehensive overview of the fundamental elements of blockchain network models. We discuss how blockchain data can be abstracted as various types of networks, and how such associated network abstractions can be further used to reap important insights into the structure, organization, and functionality of blockchains.
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