The National Research Council of Canada (NRC) has officially announced the launch of a new blockchain explorer.

The Ethereum-based blockchain explorer has been developed by Bitaccess using the Catena Blockchain Suite, through the NRC's Industrial Research Assistance Program (IRAP). It is hosted on the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS).

Web applications hosted on IPFS, a peer-to-peer method of storing and sharing data, are unalterable and can be accessed even if the original web host goes offline. The NRC said that the move to IPFS will ensure that the application is hosted by a multitude of computers so data is always accessible and immutable.

This follows the successful launch of the Canadian government’s first-ever live trial of public blockchain technology on Ethereum for the transparent administration of government contracts earlier this year. The program started proactively publishing information on new and amended Contribution Agreements with firms in real time.

Using the explorer application, users can instantly search the Ethereum blockchain for proactively published data on grants and contribution, Bitaccess said.

“Our goal is to enable institutions to become fully transparent, and enable constituents to participate in the verification and validation of public information” Moe Adham, co-founder of Bitaccess, said in a statement. “We built the Catena Blockchain Suite as a simple, low risk, application for institutions to get introduced to blockchain technology. So far the reception has been terrific”.

Since the launch, NRC IRAP has been working on the ways in which it could harness blockchain potential in other areas and share data with the public in a reliable manner.

“These are early days, but NRC IRAP's experiments with blockchain are expected to provide constructive insight into the potential for this technology and how it may be used for more open and transparent operations for public programs,” NRC said.