Originally published on: November 12, 2024
A recent social media post by an Ethereum researcher has sparked excitement and speculation within the blockchain community. Joe Lubin, the CEO of Consensys, hinted at the possibility of reviving the concept of sharding to address Ethereum’s scalability issues.
On Nov. 11, researcher Justin Drake teased an upcoming “ambitious” initiative for Ethereum, hinting at a potential redesign of the consensus layer to tackle scalability challenges. The full proposal is set to be unveiled at Devcon in Bangkok, Thailand, on Nov. 12.
In an interview with Cointelegraph, Lubin discussed Drake’s ideas, suggesting a focus on sharding execution. He explained the development of a zero-knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machine (zkEVM) at layer 1 could lead to multiple execution shards, potentially increasing Ethereum’s transactions per second (TPS) to millions.
While the concept of sharding was previously set aside due to technical limitations, Lubin believes it could make a comeback with Drake’s proposal. He emphasized the scalability benefits of consolidating computation into single transactions every two seconds or less.
Although the potential for millions of TPS is exciting, Lubin cautioned that achieving this scale could take years. Speculation around an “ETH 3.0” upgrade has been circulating within the Ethereum community, with rumors of a new consensus algorithm targeting 1-second block times and a native zkEVM.
Ambient Finance founder Doug Colkitt expressed optimism about the possibility of a native zkEVM, highlighting its potential for arbitrary scalability and reducing the reliance on layer-2 rollups. However, not all community members are convinced, with some dismissing the ETH 3.0 speculation as baseless.
As Ethereum continues to evolve and explore scalability solutions, the potential revival of sharding offers hope for a more efficient and high-throughput blockchain network. Stay tuned for updates on this groundbreaking development!
