Mining is the process through which cryptocurrency transactions are gathered, verified and recorded into a digital ledger known as blockchain. The work done by miners is essential for maintaining the integrity of the network and is also responsible for introducing new coins into the system. Within the traditional banking system, fiat currency is printed and distributed by financial institutions and governmental authorities - but for most cryptocurrencies, the issuance of new coins is not in the hands of centralized entities. Instead, new cryptocurrency units are generated through the process of mining, which follows a predefined set of rules established by the underlying protocol. While the protocol defines what the primary rules are, the so-called consensus algorithms outline how these rules will be followed (for instance, during the validation of transactions). Taking Bitcoin as an example, the participants involved in the process of mining are called mining nodes (or just miners), and they play a key role in the security of the blockchain network. The job of a miner is to gather unconfirmed transactions from the memory pool and organize them into a candidate block that they will try to validate.