DA Track Core Project Inventory

Original Author: Snow

Original translation: Viper

Article Review: Edward, Piccolo, Elisa, Ashley, Joyce

Introduction

With the development of blockchain technology, decentralized data availability has become one of the important directions to solve one of the three major challenges of blockchain. In this context, projects such as Celestia, EigenLayer, Avail DA, and NEAR DA have emerged, aiming to solve the scalability and performance issues of blockchain through innovative technology and design, and promote the development of the blockchain ecosystem.

Data Availability Issue

Introduction to Data Availability

In today's blockchain architecture, Data Availability (DA) is a critical component. Unlike traditional single-blockchain, modular blockchain decomposes the network into different functional layers, including execution, Data Availability (DA), consensus, and settlement. In these layers, the Data Availability (DA) layer is responsible for storing the data required to verify the validity of transactions.

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Data Availability Issues

In blockchain and distributed ledger technology, data availability is a crucial challenge. The core is to ensure that all transaction data can be publicly accessed and verified on the network, which is essential for maintaining the integrity and security of the blockchain system.

In the blockchain system, each block's transaction data needs to be validated by network nodes. However, ensuring that these data can be reliably distributed to the entire network and ensuring equal access for all participants is a key issue.

Why is data availability important?

Off-chain transactions: L2 solution aims to handle transactions outside the mainchain to improve the scalability of the entire system. However, this approach may bring some challenges, as L2 does not immediately record all transaction data on the L1 blockchain, which may lead to certain difficulties in verifying the integrity and accuracy of all transaction data.

Dependency on L1 security for Layer 1: Although L2 networks have the ability to operate independently and process transactions, they still rely on the L1 network to ensure overall security. Ensuring the integrity and accuracy of data transmission from L2 to L1 is crucial to maintaining the integrity of the entire network.

Dependence of the solution mechanism on data: L2 networks can apply fraud proof and other mechanisms to resolve potential disputes. The effectiveness of these mechanisms lies in the availability and accessibility of transaction data.

Transparency and trust issues: In blockchain technology, transparency is a crucial principle. In L2 networks, any issues regarding data availability could trigger a crisis of confidence, as users may not be able to independently verify the authenticity of transactions.

Increased complexity of validation: The introduction of L2 has increased the complexity of ensuring data accuracy and returning to the mainchain, which also brings risks to data availability and affects the reliability of the network.

DA Solution

The solutions for the DA layer are diverse. Generally speaking, they can be divided into two main types: on-chain and off-chain.

In Layer 2 solutions, data availability is typically achieved in two different ways:

• On-chain data availability: All transaction data is stored on the L1 chain, which offers higher security but also higher costs. This means that L2 will still use Ethereum as the DA layer and rely on Ethereum to reduce the cost of data availability.
• Off-chain data availability: Data is stored off-chain, with only the encrypted information digest (hash value) stored on-chain. This approach is cost-effective, but requires reliance on external entities to retrieve the data. In other words, Ethereum will no longer be used as the DA layer, but rather seek more economical ways to achieve data availability. Based on different levels of decentralization and security, off-chain solutions can be classified into four types: Validium, Data Availability Committee (DAC), Volition, and Generalized DA Solution.

DA Track Project Review

Participants in the Data Availability (DA) field are relatively few, with key projects like Celestia, Eigenlayer, Avail, and Near DA, in addition to Ethereum, each with their own unique progress. In DA projects, factors such as security, customizability, interoperability, and cost are crucial.

Celestia

Celestia is the first project to adopt a modular data availability (DA) network, aiming to expand the user base's rise in a secure manner. Its modular design allows anyone to easily launch independent blockchains.

As a leader in modular public chains, Celestia is developed based on Cosmos SDK and is committed to improving data availability. On the mainnet, Celestia has achieved significant competitive advantages.

Technical Features

The design of Celestia separates execution, consensus, settlement, and data availability. This modular structure allows specialization and optimization at every level, improving the overall efficiency and scalability of the network.

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Data Availability Sampling (DAS)

Data Availability Sampling (DAS) is a method that allows light nodes to verify data availability without downloading the entire block. By randomly sampling data blocks, light nodes can verify whether this data can be successfully retrieved and validated, thereby inferring the availability of data for the entire block.

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Namespace Merkle Tree (NMTs)

NMTs allow block data to be partitioned into separate namespaces for different applications. This means that each application only needs to download and process data related to it, significantly reducing data processing requirements.

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Feature Analysis

Celestia's Rollups are different from Ethereum Rollups. Their operation on Celestia independently determines the specification state, which increases the autonomy of the nodes. Nodes can choose their operating modes freely through soft and hard forks, reducing dependence on centralized governance and promoting more experimentation and innovation.

Celestia's Rollups have features unrelated to execution, which means they are not limited to EVM-compatible design. This openness provides a broader space for innovation in the virtual machine, which helps drive technological development.

Celestia simplifies the deployment process of blockchain. With tools like Optimint, developers can quickly deploy new chains without worrying about the complexity and high cost of the consensus mechanism.

Celestia separates the handling of active state rise and historical data storage, providing a more efficient resource pricing mechanism. This approach reduces the mutual influence between execution environments and improves user experience.

Celestia's architecture supports the creation of trust-minimized bridges, enabling different chains to securely interconnect and enhance the security and interoperability of blockchain clusters.

Celestia is the first modularly designed DA network, whose main goal is to securely scale in the face of rising user numbers. Through its modular structure, launching independent blockchains becomes simple. With its unique approach and technological innovation, Celestia is expected to play a significant role in the blockchain industry. It focuses on addressing the challenges faced by blockchain, especially scalability issues, while maintaining security and decentralization, making it an important participant in the continuously growing blockchain ecosystem.

Eigen DA

EigenLayer is a restaking protocol that allows users to stake ETH, lsdETH, and LP Tokens on other sidechains, oracle machines, and other platforms and earn validation rewards as nodes. Eigen DA is a decentralized data availability (DA) service built on Ethereum using EigenLayer Restaking, and will be the first Active Validation Service (AVS) on EigenLayer.

Technical Features

Enhancing Ethereum's data availability: Eigen DA leverages Blob block data and KZG commitments to enhance Ethereum's data availability. Node validation work is performed by Validators of Ethereum, and the entire process is built around Ethereum's existing infrastructure.

No self-sovereign consensus and P2P network: Eigen DA nodes re-stake ETH in the EigenLayer contract on Ethereum L1 to become a subset of Ethereum validators. Through custody proof, each operator must regularly calculate and submit the value of a function, only when they have stored all blob blocks allocated to them within a specified storage period, can they calculate the value of the function. If they prove blobs without calculating this function, anyone with access to their data items can slash the ETH held by the node, ensuring the security and reliability of the network.

EigenLayer Consensus Mechanism: ETH stakers can choose to validate the Eigen DA network and accept Eigen DA specific slashing conditions. They then act as POS validators to prove the network state.

Data Availability Layer: Eigen DA will decompose the data into small chunks and perform erasure coding and KCG polynomial commitments on these chunks to facilitate each node downloading only a small part of the system. Even if half of the nodes leave, it will not affect the system. They can do this because even if some blocks are lost, erasure coding can rebuild the complete data state, and the KZG proof ensures that the blocks they receive are the same as the blocks declared by the nodes.

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Feature Analysis

Eigen DA nodes are a subset of the re-stake nodes in the EigenLayer network, and becoming an Eigen DA node does not require additional stake cost.

Existing DA solutions use P2P networks to transmit Blobs, where operators receive Blobs from their peers and then rebroadcast the same Blobs to others. This greatly limits the achievable DA rate. In EigenDA, the disperser sends the blob directly to EigenDA operators. By dispersing data through direct communication, data propagation is no longer limited by consensus protocols and P2P network throughput, thereby reducing communication, network latency, and confirmation time, and improving data submission speed.

Eigen DA inherits some of the security of Ethereum and has higher security compared to other DA solutions.

Eigen DA also supports Rollup to flexibly choose different staking token models, erasure coding ratios, etc., providing higher flexibility.

As the final confirmation of Eigen DA depends on the Eigen DA contract on the Ethereum mainnet, the cost of Eigen DA in terms of final confirmation time will be significantly higher than that of other DA solutions.

Eigen DA adopts advanced technologies such as erasure coding, KZG commitment, and ACeD, and decouples data availability (DA) from consensus, making it perform outstandingly in transaction throughput, node load, and DA cost, far exceeding Ethereum's DA solution. Compared to other DA solutions, Eigen DA has lower startup and stake costs, faster network communication and data submission speed, and higher flexibility. Therefore, Eigen DA is expected to become a new competitor in the DA market and may carry some of Ethereum's DA services.

TNA Protocol

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TNA Protocol is a Bitcoin asset and security protocol that integrates the issuance of full-chain domain name assets and DA solutions. Based on in-depth research on the availability of Bitcoin data, TNA Protocol has launched TNA Core, a BLOB-based DA framework that can synchronize states between the Bitcoin mainnet and layer 2 networks, as well as between multiple Bitcoin layer 2 networks, while ensuring security and cost-effectiveness. The solutions of TNA Core can be well integrated into major Bitcoin DA solutions such as Nubit, B Squared, etc., to assist in achieving more efficient data availability.

In addition, the DA scheme of TNA Core and its domain asset Tapnames, which can be issued across the entire chain, can be closely integrated to directly define the standard for cross-chain interoperability, allowing users to seamlessly trade domain names across various networks, with TNA Core providing a security barrier.

The narrative upgrade of TNA Protocol is of great significance, which is reflected in the dual benefits of price and product. Firstly, the narrative upgrade, together with the new economic model, is conducive to TNA Protocol seeking new liquidity and trading scenarios for tokens, which makes the potential price growth opportunities of tokens larger and clearer; through the cross-chain interoperability standards defined by the domain-based and DA layer solutions, it will also increase the use cases of TNA Protocol-related tokens, thereby helping to enhance the value of tokens.

Secondly, this narrative upgrade will also bring significant benefits to the product. The new Cross-Chain Interaction standard for Bitcoin will make Tapnames domains more competitive by promoting an enhanced user experience and the adoption of more second-layer networks, attracting more users to participate and use them.

Therefore, this narrative upgrade will not only have a direct positive impact on the community and the currency price, but also drive the development of the product and the prosperity of the ecosystem, laying a solid foundation for the long-term sustainable development of the entire ecosystem.

Avail DA aims to address the needs of the next generation of trust-minimized applications and sovereign aggregation. Its key advantage lies in the use of innovative security approaches, allowing light clients to easily verify data availability through peer-to-peer network sampling. With the unparalleled data availability interface and powerful security features provided by Avail DA, developers can create blockchain applications based on zero-knowledge or anti-fraud technologies more efficiently and easily.

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Avail DA Analysis

Avail is a blockchain compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), featuring efficient transaction ordering and recording, as well as providing data storage and feasibility verification. Compared to traditional smart contracts and underlying layer dependencies, Avail allows Rollup to directly publish data on it and verify it through a light client network. This modular design enables developers to store data on Avail and choose other networks for settlement, providing greater flexibility and choice.

Avail's consensus mechanism inherits the BABE and GRANDPA consensus mechanisms from the Polkadot SDK, and adopts Polkadot's Nominated Proof of Stake (NPoS), supporting up to 1000 verification nodes. In addition to a powerful consensus mechanism, Avail also has the characteristic of decentralization, providing an efficient and reliable backup mechanism through the P2P network of light clients for data sampling, ensuring the availability of data even in the event of failure.

Avail performs well in transaction ordering, recording, and data feasibility verification, supporting Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-compatible blockchains. Its light client network verification mechanism allows Rollups on Avail to verify states through the light client network without relying on smart contracts and the underlying layer. Due to its modular nature, developers can store data on Avail and choose other networks for settlement.

Node Types

Full Node: These nodes are responsible for downloading and verifying the correctness of the blocks, but do not participate in the consensus process. Their role is crucial for ensuring the integrity of the network.

• Verification Node: These nodes are the core of the Avail DA consensus mechanism. They are responsible for generating blocks, determining included transactions, and maintaining the order of the network. Validator nodes obtain incentives through consensus participation and are the basis of DA layer operation.
• Light Client: Operates under limited resources, light clients rely on block headers to participate in the network. They can query full nodes for specific transaction data as needed, which is crucial for maintaining decentralization and network accessibility.

Near DA

On November 8, 2023, the NEAR Foundation announced the launch of the NEAR Data Availability (NEAR DA) Layer, providing powerful and cost-effective data availability for ETH rollup and Ethereum developers. The first batch of users includes Madara, Caldera, Fluent, Vistara, Dymension RollApps, and Movement Labs of StarkNet.

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Technical Architecture

NEAR DA utilizes an important part of the NEAR consensus mechanism, called Nightshade, which parallelizes the network into multiple shards.

Each shard on NEAR generates a small part of the block called a chunk, which are aggregated to produce the block. When a block producer processes a receipt, consensus needs to be reached for the corresponding receipt. Once the block is processed and included in the block, the receipt is no longer needed for consensus and can be removed from the blockchain state. Therefore, NEAR does not slow down its consensus speed when there is more data than needed, but any user of NEAR DA will have sufficient time to query transaction data. Therefore, for any Rollup scheme, scalable and cost-effective data availability is essential. As the NEAR protocol moves towards stateless validation, it will further reduce the hardware requirements of certain types of validators (block validators). By storing the state in memory, NEAR can support more shards, thus increasing the decentralization of the system.

Analysis of advantages

In NEAR DA, consensus validation is provided by NEAR validators, who reach consensus when processing blob submissions. In terms of data persistence, full nodes store functional input data for at least three days, while archival nodes can store data for a longer period of time.

NEAR DA's design ensures efficient utilization of consensus without wasting too much data. In addition, these data have been indexed by all major browsers on NEAR to provide support for indexers.

Finally, for the commitment to long-term availability, NEAR DA adopts an easy-to-create approach that anyone can use limited expertise and tools to build commitments.

NEAR-Polygon CDK integration allows developers to build their own Rollup and become part of the Polygon ecosystem.

This is the first integration of NEAR DA with zero-knowledge based Layer 2 stack, providing developers seeking scalable data availability solutions with more options.

Summary

In the field of blockchain, the competition between DA projects such as Celestia, EigenLayer, Avail DA, and NEAR DA is fierce. Although DA layer projects are emerging like bamboo shoots after rain, their core technologies are not complicated, and each project has its unique technology and competitive advantages. These projects demonstrate the diversity and innovation in the field of blockchain technology. In the future, as these projects continue to develop and mature, they are expected to make important contributions to the further growth and development of the blockchain ecosystem.