Since the birth of blockchain in 2009, a variety of consensus mechanisms appeared. The consensus mechanism is the soul of Blockchain. The evolution of the consensus mechanism has witnessed the iteration of the cryptocurrency market. This article will analyze in detail the three mainstream consensus mechanism: PoW(Proof of Work) , PoS(Proof of Stake)and PoST (Proof of Space and Time) and the characteristics and the respective projects.
This article also explains why Chia (PoST) has huge potential in the future.
POW
POW is the first consensus mechanism to be applied. Satoshi Nakamoto has used the POW mechanism to make Bitcoin run stably for more than ten years. This is currently the most stable and secure consensus mechanism and the consensus algorithm with the largest computing power in the entire network.
The hash function is used in PoW. For example, the hash function SHA256 is used in Bitcoin. The basic logic: Input random value n into hash function h(), resulting an output h(n). However, if n is flipped by a single bit, it will cause a significant change in output.
In other words, if we’re given the output of the hash function h(n), there’s no feasible way to figure out what the input was. The only way to find a solution to that problem is trying all possible combinations. This way achieves the proofs of work.
The POW algorithm requires users to perform some time-consuming and complex calculations, and the answers can be quickly validated by the service party.
The POW algorithm guarantees the security of the Bitcoin network, but reduces the scalability of Bitcoin. The TPS is too low to process large-scale commercial transactions, and the application scenario is too limited. Bitcoin has extremely high security costs and consumes power. Secure physical systems cannot be shared, and the expansion of consensus is hindered as a result of the monopoly of power resources in POW and ASIC mining machines.
POW Tokens：BTC，BCH，BSV
POS
With the advent of ETH2.0, ETH will also officially shift from the PoW to the PoS mechanism. The shift is inevitable. Only the PoS consensus mechanism can enable the expansion of the ecosystem and realize large-scale commercial applications.
The principle of PoS: in the PoS consensus mechanism, there are no miners, but the verifier still exists. To become a verifier, you need to hold a certain quantity of holdings in the associated cryptocurrency. Similar to the shareholding system, whoever owns more “shares” will have more say and also the right to generate blocks in proportion to to the quantity of the holdings.
The advantages and disadvantages of PoS are obvious. The ecological advantage is considered to be the main advantage, which means that there is no need to consume huge amounts of electricity to secure the Blockchain; it does not need to compete in computing power. The maintenance cost is largely reduced. A large number of nodes will participate in the network. The increasing validators will speed up the block confirmation speed and thus the transaction speed.However, the PoS consensus mechanism will cause the network to be centralized, and the validators may start acting maliciously and carry out a 51% attack.
PoS：ETH、EOS
PoST
If PoW is currently the consensus algorithm with the largest computing power, PoST is the algorithm with the largest potential audience in the world. By allocating unused hard drive space for storage space, everyone can participate in mining.
PoST uses a consensus mechanism by combining proof of space and proof of time. It uses spare hard drive space and a verifiable delay function VDF to implement the mining process. A large number of external attacks can be eliminated.
POW requires a large number of ASIC mining equipment, while PoST only requires hard drive, and the threshold for participation is lowered, which is more friendly to retail miners around the world. PoST resolves the trust and integrity problem of the blockchain network at a lower cost, with almost no electricity resources consumed. PoST, as a trusted ecology that can be shared, is very friendly to the development of ecological applications.
PoST: Chia(XCH)
We have discussed about features and characteristics of POW, POS and PoST consensus above, now let’s take a closer look at why Chia will have more potential in the future, and we will also take a look at the current state of Chia, as well as technical advantages.
As well-known to all, a healthy growth of the consensus-mechanism is dependent on the developing of applications on the eco-system, the PoW consensus mainly serves for BTC, its functions are not adequate for commercial applications; The future of PoS consensus is based on ETH, which is a well-developed network, but the competition is fierce; PoST, on the opposite, is still at its early stage and has newest technology, it has great potential for development. PoST consensus is the most optimal for developers and investors, and Chia, is the best bridge to the PoST race track.
Now let me introduce Chia project briefly:
Chia crypto currency was started by the founder of BitTorrent, Bram Cohen, the core team members include: Ryan Singer — CEO and co-founder of the biggest Bitcoin exchange Tradehill Inc; Krzysztof Pietrzak — Cryptography expert, assistance professor at Austrian Association for Science and Technology (IST); Elizabeth Stark: staff at Stanford and Yales, researching on P2P technology, privacy, open-source software and media, and an active contributor to Bitcoin community, consultant at startup companies in cryptocurrency, distributed technology and AI.
Chia has received investment from leading institutions including Naval Ravikant，A16Z、Greylock、True Ventures、MetaStable、Greylock Partners, Danhua Capital, Dcm、Slow Ventures、Stillmark、Galaxy investment group.
Chia team and investors behind have solid backgrounds, as the spokesperson of PoST consensus and first project which created its own programming language: Chialisp, Chia’s technological advantages are not difficult to be noticed.
1. Advantages of PoST (Proofs of Space and Time)
•Safe, Proofs of space can prevent attacks: Delay function used in Proofs of times can effectively avoid malicious attacks such as spam, DDoS, email, 51 attacks, etc.
•Energy saving, environment-friendly: hard drive use relatively less electricity, low dependence on energy.
•Lower the threshold for participation, accessible for everyone: Everybody can hold one vote as long as they participate by possessing hard drive.
•More decentralized, Anti-ASIC: Avoided monopoly of professional mining equipment, by handing the right over to every miner, the computing power is more dispersed and decentralized.
2. Chia introduced a brand-new blockchain programming language — Chialisp, it’s powerful, easy to audit and safe.
Chialisp is an excellent developing environment for blockchain smart transactions, it unlocks the features promised by cryptocurrencies, such as security, transparency and easy-to-use. This is a type of programming language that can facilitate smart contract transactions even better, at this moment, it supports smart contract transactions such as atomic swap, authorized payee, recoverable wallet, multi-signature wallet and prize-limit wallet.
The most important feature and the biggest advantage of Chialisp is that it not only keeps the “UTXO model”, but also adds in regular functions of “Ethereum Solidity model”, to enable more power functions:
•Chialisp simplifies UTXO format, only contains main input, puzzle hash and quantity;
•Transactions occurs simultaneously on Chialisp, not sequently.
•Signatures are fulfilled using BLS, BLS is a format which is non-interactive aggregatable, and the aggregation can always be completed.
•This type of language has no side-effect. Therefore, the requests and part of the requests can be implemented in a more general and better way compared to the taproot proposal introduced by Bitcoin.
•The requirements of the solutions (scriptsigs) for all puzzles (called scriptpubkey in Bitcoin) will be shown in its return value.
•Chialisp is a turing complete language, the quick implementation is much more simpler than Solidity of Ethereum.
•Chialisp language possesses the necessary primitive languages used in the calculation of token ID, and the token can declare its own ID, which supports explicit self-reference, and therefore avoids the use of self-generated program Quine.
Furthermore, Chia provides programming tricks to expand more functions, by using these tricks, developers can flexibly expand and deploy new features without requiring opcode.
3.Global sharing, new projects can enjoy consensus strength of the entire network
The new projects developed on Chia mainnet can enjoy the same hash power as the whole Chia network and the same package of underlying plot, and therefore the equal amount of hash-power resources as Chia network. This advantage can be found in Chia only, not in BTC or ETH, by sharing hash-power resources, Chia achieves the convergence of a broader consensus.
Chia is currently at the early-stage of dividend period, which is the right time to enter for the miners, developers and investors; The hashrate in Chia network has reached 23.8 EiP, it can meet the demands of construction and expansion of new projects. Chia’s own technical advantages can also enable it to quickly expand its territory in the blockchain ecology. The construction of the Chia eco-system is an urgent matter for Chia.
Therefore, Sirius Labs’ members initiated the Hackathon platform, for holding global online Hackathon events based on POC consensus, Sirius Labs will grant $500,000 to prize pool, and each winning team will receive a financial reward up to $100,000! In addition, Sirius Labs has designed one series of technical training camps, together with the technical team, to instruct how to program and develop. The winning teams will receive not on start-up capital, but also will have access to incubation service from top institutions in blockchain industry, which will help them start project roadshows worldwide.
Sirius Labs is headquartered in Oslo, Norway and focused on Blockchain investment and incubation. The team members come from the United States, Norway, France, the United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, Singapore and other regions.
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