Merkle

Merkle, often associated with Merkle trees in computer science, is a method of efficiently and securely verifying large sets of data. Imagine a digital "family tree" where each leaf represents a piece of data, and each branch combines hashes (unique digital fingerprints) of its children. By using these hashes, one can quickly confirm that data hasn't been altered anywhere in the tree without checking every piece. This structure ensures data integrity and tamper-evidence, and is widely used in blockchain and cryptography to securely verify transactions and data batches efficiently.