Basic Information

  • Course Code: EE465
  • Course Name: Cryptocurrency and Blockchain Technologies
  • Course Offered In: 2023-2024
  • Semester Season: Spring
  • Instructors: Prof Saravanan Vijayakumaran
  • Prerequisites: EE720 or equivalent courses
  • Difficulty (1 being easy and 5 being tough): 3

Course Content

The course covered a wide range of topics based on cryptocurrencies and delved into the foundations of Bitcoin, Ethereum, Smart contracts, Tornado cash, Monero, and so on. It gave a holistic understanding of the functioning of the complex systems that drive these cryptocurrencies and had some hands-on aspects as well in the assignments. Also taught basics of circom and rust. The course lectures and evaluation details can be found here: https://www.ee.iitb.ac.in/~sarva/courses/EE465/Spring2024.html

Feedback on Lectures

The lectures were thorough and dived deep into the concepts mentioned above. They consisted of a lot of information and paying attention and attending all lectures was a must to be on the same page with the pace of the course. Good explanations of concepts explained in class might not be easily found online, but the professor explained them well. One could go to his office without hesitation and understand topics that felt cloudy.

Feedback on Evaluations

Grading was almost a bell curve. As for evaluations, check the link above.

Study Material and Resources

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Follow-up Courses

Any course on cryptocurrencies. This is an advanced course built on top of EE720 as a requirement in the first place, and the EE department does not yet have a course that is a follow-up from this one. One may find courses in the CS department though.

Final Takeaway

This course has a lot of information and would require you to be attentive. It demands regular assignment submissions, but they are easy. The professor explains concepts beautifully and motivates interactive lectures. The content is also fairly interesting but vastly different from the axiomatic approach in EE720. If you want to dig deep into cryptocurrencies, this is definitely a very good course to do so.