The hypercore[1] signed append-only log which is the heart of the Dat protocol[2] is an implementation of very similar ideas. The data structure consists of an append-only log, a Merkle tree (stored in the "inorder storage layout" described in Appendix B), and signatures for each of the root hashes of the Merkle tree. The public key ("read key") of the key pair which is used to sign the tree roots can be used as a unique identifier of the contents of the log, eg. for looking up peers in a DHT which can serve the contents. It features a replication protocol which is similar to the one described in the article (if you squint hard enough). A fantastic in-depth explainer of the data structure and the protocol is available at [3].

The current implementation is in Node.js, but a Rust port is under way. [4]

[1]: https://github.com/mafintosh/hypercore [2]: https://www.datprotocol.com/ [3]: https://datprotocol.github.io/how-dat-works/ [4]: https://github.com/datrs/hypercore