TON Blockchain: An Innovative Path to High Concurrency and High Scalability

The TON blockchain is a decentralized computing network that includes a main chain and multiple components. It was originally developed by the Telegram team and is now maintained by a global community of independent contributors. In 2017, the Telegram team began exploring blockchain solutions to address their own needs, and due to the inability of existing L1 blockchains to support their large user base, they decided to design their own blockchain. In 2018, the project launched its token sale. In 2020, due to regulatory issues, the Telegram team withdrew, and some open-source developers took over and renamed it The Open Network to continue development.

As a decentralized execution environment for Telegram, TON faces challenges of high concurrent requests and massive data. Currently, the TPS of mainstream high-performance blockchains is difficult to meet the demand of millions of TPS. In addition, the vast amount of data generated by the Telegram ecosystem also poses challenges for storage.

To address these issues, TON has innovated mainstream blockchain protocols:

1. Adopts the "infinite sharding paradigm" design to solve data redundancy issues and enhance performance.
2. Introduce a parallel execution environment based on the Actor model to significantly increase network TPS.
3. Implement a multi-layer chain structure.

The four-layer chain structure of TON includes:

• Account Chain: A virtual concept representing transactions related to a single account.
• Shard Chain: The actual constituent unit, containing multiple account chains.
• Work Chain: A collection of shard chains with custom rules.
• Main Chain: Responsible for the finality confirmation of all shard chains.

Features of the TON network:

• Dynamic Sharding: Automatically adjusts shards to accommodate load changes.
• Highly scalable: theoretically supports a large number of shards.
• Adaptability: Dynamically adjust the network structure based on the load.

To solve the cross-chain communication problem, TON uses the "hypercube routing algorithm" and optimistic technology solutions to improve communication efficiency.

TON adopts the BFT+PoS consensus mechanism, randomly selecting validators to participate in block production. The execution of smart contracts is based on a parallel environment using the Actor model, significantly improving processing efficiency.

In 2024, TON has gained widespread attention due to its innovative design and high performance. Its token price rose from about $2.72 at the beginning of the year to $4.38, with a market capitalization increasing to $15.5 billion. The total locked amount approached $450 million, demonstrating strong ecological appeal.

The price increase is mainly attributed to Telegram's further integration of the TON Blockchain. Telegram announced that channel owners can earn advertising revenue through TON tokens, while TON tokens can be used to purchase multiple services on Telegram, significantly enhancing their utility.