The distributed ledger technology (DLT) landscape comprises a wide range of independent networks with little to none built-in interoperability. To be applied in traditional enterprises, these DLT systems must also interact with legacy systems with no support for the processes of a DLT. An important topic in DLT research is, therefore, to establish standardised protocols for cross-network transfer and exchange of data and assets. Ideally, these protocols should be general-purpose so that they can be applied on top of many different types of ledger systems. One such protocol, supporting asset transfer, is the Secure Asset Transfer Protocol (SATP or 'SAT protocol') in development by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). The SATP Core protocol draft by Hargreaves et al. (2024) describes an interoperability protocol that can facilitate asset transfer between two DLT systems, as well as between a DLT system and a non-DLT system. In either case, the SAT protocol imposes no restrictions on the underlying system implementations. Building on this work, in this paper, we present an adaptation of SATP that facilitates cross-network asset exchanges. This asset exchange protocol, named the Secure Asset Exchange Protocol, inherits the key advantages of SATP but enables asset exchanges instead of asset transfers.

Securely transferring tokenised assets between largely non-interoperable blockchain networks is a great challenge to take on. Implementations must coordinate transactions on multiple blockchain networks which have inherently different characteristics and functionality. Moreover, implementations must coordinate transactions in strict order, in an atomic, synchronised way so that owners do not risk their assets becoming lost, while also mitigating the age-old problem of “avoiding double spend”. Several protocols for cross-network asset transfer, i.e. the bridging of assets, exist, and several production bridge implementations exist. However, frequent high-profile security breaches have arguably given bridges a bad reputation. Therefore, there is a clear need for standardised bridge protocols to re-establish trust. One initiative for standardising cross-network bridges is the Secure Asset Transfer Protocol (SATP) developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). This protocol establishes four distinctive phases for the asset transfer process, driven by a standardised messaging cycle between specialised bridge orchestration applications, known as gateways. In this paper, we demonstrate a reference framework with functions needed to implement SATP. We describe our implementation of this reference framework, why SATP is unique and why SATP is likely to be an important contribution to powering future bridges.

Cyberinfrastructures in ecology have coevolved alongside fields excellent at expanding the landscape of big data acquisition. Arguably, they offer better technological solutions for mobilising ‘born digital’ data (e.g. sensor technologies and citizen science), then they do for low velocity, resource intensive ecological data which are inherently tied to sociological and cultural constraints limiting sharing. Such barriers can be summarised as trust, transparency and control, fundamental properties on which blockchain technologies have been prefiguratively designed. While this nascent decentralised ledger technology (DLT) is receiving increasing attention among the sciences, focus is yet to be directed at its potential utility to bolster open ecological data. In this viewpoint we offer insight into how blockchain technology could be leveraged to help normalise and incentivize open ecological data and its potential to help culture a paradigm shift from data proprietorship towards data stewardship.