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Modularization: Ethereum's road to breaking through the next decade

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If the narrative logic of the future blockchain network is still built on financial primitives, then perhaps ETH2.0 with Rollups at its core will be the visible end of the modular road.

Original title: " Exploration of the road to break the situation - block chain modularization "

Original author: Codex Labs

It has been 5 years since Vitalik Buterin proposed The Blockchain Trilemma, whether it is ETH-core The community, as well as developers of other public chains, are trying to find the key to unlock the next generation of blockchains.

In his Endgame article, Vitalik describes what he thinks is the ultimate form of Ethereum, and spends a lot of space describing a new Ethereum built by Rollups and DA. Ethereum. Undoubtedly, to some extent, it points out the way of Ethereum's breakthrough in the next ten years: Modularization.

As we know, whether it is Ethereum or the new public chains, they have already started their own modularization road, only the "answer sheet" The methods are different, and also form a completely different technical route.

1. Blockchain layering

In fact, Ethereum itself has The chain is divided into multiple layers, but in the 1.0 era, nodes assumed the responsibilities of all levels. We can follow the idea of Ethereum and split the blockchain into four levels:

Consensus Layer (Consensus Layer): determines the order and effectiveness of transactions Consistency and consistency between nodes

Data Availability Layer (Data Availability Layer): ensure that transaction data can be used (guaranteed storage and verifiable and available)

Settlement Layer: Settle out state commitments

Execution Layer: Calculate state transitions

Return to Ethereum In the narrative logic of "world computer", the block chain module is compared with the computer structure, then:

The consensus layer of the block chain Maintain the consensus algorithm of the distributed computer cluster

The operating system of the execution layer computer of the blockchain (the environment that actually executes instructions)

The DA layer computer of the blockchain memory (to achieve short-term data access)

CPU of the settlement layer computer of the blockchain (hardware guarantees the correctness of instruction execution)

< p>It is worth mentioning that the EigenLayr project further divided the consensus layer very groundbreakingly. He understood the role of the PoS consensus layer as being responsible for maintaining the consistency of the distributed system and The trust foundation of the network is maintained through mechanisms such as pledge. As a result, two sub-layers are generated:

Trust layer: it is composed of the bottom-level validator nodes, or it is pledged to join the Ethereum network

Consistency layer: connect each node to maintain the consistency of this huge distributed system

It is the distinction of these levels (modules) that provides the basis for the modular development of the blockchain, resulting in the emergence of various dismantling schemes for the main chain.

2. Project Mapping

In the hierarchical logic we mentioned above, Trust is gradually passed from the consensus (trust) end to the execution layer, and the core starting point of the separation module is to reduce the burden on the main network without damaging the original trust system as much as possible.

2.1 Secured Rollups

Obviously the first one to be dismantled is located in the trust Execution layer at the end of the system. Therefore, various Rollups based on Ethereum came into being. Whether it is optimistic Rollups based on fraud proofs or zk-Rollups based on validity proofs, the existing solution is to hand over the execution layer to the off-chain. The settlement, DA and consensus are handed over to Layer1 to continue to undertake, which is of course the most intuitive solution.

We call it Secured Rollups, which can be understood as Rollups protected by Layer1. This name comes from the official documentation of Ethereum, about Scailing Description:

For some solutions the layer 2 instance then batches them into groups before anchoring them to layer 1, after which they are secured by layer 1 and cannot be altered. The details of how this is done vary significantly between different layer 2 technologies and implementations.

However, having "dismantling" often means "connecting" The problem will surface, and almost all mainstream Rollups now hold the centralized power of transaction ordering. Of course, as an important component connecting the execution layer and the main network, the centralization of Sequencer is bound to help improve system efficiency, but the "dark forest" formed by the high concentration of transaction sequencing power is unavoidable. Get caught up in concerns about MEV attacks (Shutter Network is working on making Sequencer trustless by introducing threshold encryption).

2.2 Sovereign Rollups

The current Rollup on the Ethereum Post to an EVM-based smart contract, also known as a bridge contract. This contract effectively implements an on-chain light client for Rollup that receives block headers and handles fraud or validity proofs.

In this model, we believe that Ethereum is regarded as the coupling settlement layer of Rollup, where Rollup is the "baby chain" of Ethereum, not a An independent chain with its own rights.

To make an inappropriate analogy, the Ethereum Rollups that only separate the execution layer are like "moving bricks" (computing) "Wage earners" do not have any power to participate in the final game (settlement). It is still up to L1 to determine how and in what order the bricks will be stacked.

The design of Celestia obviously won more power for Rollups, and it defines a new way of module division: Sovereign Rollups, namely sovereign Rollups .

Sovereign Rollups on Celestia do not publish their blocks into smart contracts, but directly on-chain as raw data. The Celestia consensus and data availability layer does not interpret or perform any calculations on Rollup blocks, nor does it run on-chain light clients for Rollups.

2.3 Danksharding

Whether it is Danksharding or the original data fragmentation scheme, the essence Above all hope to solve the problem of DA layer. In the context of modular blockchains, Danksharding obviously improves the ability of the Ethereum mainnet to undertake the data availability layer.

Danksharding uses Data Availability Sampling (DAS) technology to realize "decentralized validators". In this regard, Celestia's solution is very similar.

Although we know that the ultimate form of the Ethereum consensus layer will still assume the responsibility of settlement and data availability. However, the decentralization of verification work achieved by DAS technology greatly reduces the cost of participating in network verification, thereby further releasing the performance of the main network.

After the Danksharding fork, the Ethereum mainnet bears part of the power to review data availability, and Rollups Bears the power of the DA layer.

2.4 EigenLayr

We mentioned above that EigenLayr further details the consensus layer It separates the trust layer of Ethereum from the entire network, and tries to build an independent layer of EigenLayer on the trust layer. This layer relies on the trust layer network of Ethereum (or Ethereum Pon p>

Large pledge capital) to provide infrastructure/middleware service providers with a platform that can freely build consensus and applications.

Among them, how to connect the Ethereum trust layer and EigenLayer is the key point of the whole design. EigenLayr cleverly proposed a brand new concept of Restaking. Pledge nodes on Ethereum can voluntarily choose to join EigenLayr. On the other hand, middleware/infrastructure service providers who have more requirements for performance can also choose to build their own networks on EigenLayr.

EigenLayr's separation scheme is equivalent to only "borrowing" the basis of Ethereum's credit (consensus), and on this basis, we can develop Endless associations, whether it is building a new sovereign chain or building an infrastructure network, are all possible. Behind these possibilities is the huge credit foundation of the Ethereum mainnet.

2.5 Arweave

We can find that the future is visible on the road of Ethereum modularization Here, the mainnet still maintains control over the consensus layer, or the consensus layer, as the soul of Ethereum, is the "holy grail" that brings together participants and values.

It is also a modular blockchain, Arweave is obviously unique, it jumps out of the narrative logic of Ethereum, that is, it builds a set of design paradigm.

In the design of Arweave, the main network serves as the paper tape of the entire Turing machine, and records these states and transactions of each modified state at the bottom layer, realizing storage and calculation Separation of resources.

It can be said that Arweave redefines our modular segmentation, it uses the DA layer to ensure consensus, and the execution and settlement are handed over to outside the chain.

Of course, the price is: in order to ensure the validity of the latest state data, users need to download all historical state data and perform Performing the verification calculation once will obviously bring about efficiency problems (KYVE Network is working on solving the inefficiency problems caused by this part of the work).

3. Summary

Looking at the exploration of these blockchain modularization roads, Although a hundred flowers bloom, there are still traces to follow. At its root, the source of motivation for different route choices often comes from their different understandings of market demand.

The big market created by this round of DeFi has created an urgent demand for the scalability of Ethereum and the composability of different chains. It is also based on these needs that many solutions dedicated to alleviating the pressure on the main network have been launched. If the narrative logic of the future blockchain network is still built on financial primitives, then perhaps ETH2.0 with Rollups at its core will be the visible end of the modular road.

What if we jump out of the shackles of the centralized financial context and try to imagine the wider application of the blockchain? Large-scale games, real-world asset transactions, decentralized social networks, etc., then we may need a new modular solution to fully release the performance of each module.

On the other hand, for the development of the public chain itself, consensus is the core value of the public chain. As we mentioned above, no matter how Ethereum develops, it will not abandon its consensus layer in exchange for performance.

The road of block chain modularization is not only to consider the blind expansion of performance, but more importantly, to return to the attributes of the block chain itself Come up, get value from the consensus, and then give back to the consensus through value, so as to build a stronger consensus.