Vitalik's Ethereum 2.0 Blueprint: Achieving 100,000 TPS, Reviving Plasma for Layer 2 Scalability, Integrating L2 Ecosystem

With Ethereum successfully completing its highly anticipated upgrade, the community is now shifting its focus to the future development roadmap of the blockchain. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin delves into the future scalability strategy of Ethereum, particularly a phase called "The Surge," in his latest article. The article discusses the goals, challenges, progress made in this phase, and provides insights into future technological innovations.

Vitalik's post-merge Ethereum blueprint 1: Considering consensus modifications to increase finality speed

Ethereum Expansion Blueprint: From Sharding to Layer 2 Solutions

Since its inception, Ethereum's scalability roadmap has always included two main strategies. The early focus was on "sharding" technology, which allows each node to verify and store only a small portion of the transactions on the blockchain, rather than all transactions on the entire blockchain. Later, the concept of Layer 2 protocols gradually emerged, building on top of Ethereum to move most data and computations off the main chain to improve efficiency. With technological advancements, these two paths eventually merged into Ethereum's current expansion strategy centered around "Rollup" technology.

Surge: The Core of Expansion with Rollup

"Surge" is a significant milestone in Ethereum's current expansion phase, with the core idea of having Ethereum's Layer 1 focus on being a stable and decentralized base layer, while Layer 2 handles the ecosystem's expansion capabilities. Buterin describes this division of labor as similar to a legal system where L1's main function is to maintain order, while L2 entrepreneurs can innovate on top of this foundation.

In 2023, the "Surge" phase made significant progress, including the implementation of EIP-4844 blobs to increase L1's data bandwidth, and multiple Rollup protocols entering their first deployment phase. The expansion strategy centered around Rollup aims to achieve sharding effects through various L2 protocols, where each L2 blockchain or shard has its own internal rules and logic.

Ethereum's Challenge on Scalability Trilemma

Vitalik mentioned the "Scalability Trilemma" first proposed in 2017, which highlights the trade-offs between decentralization, scalability, and security. In such cases, a system typically can only optimize two of these attributes. To overcome this dilemma, Buterin emphasized the crucial role of technologies like Data Availability Sampling and SNARKs, allowing nodes to verify large-scale data availability and computations with minimal data downloads.

Core Goal: Achieving 100,000+ TPS while Maintaining Decentralization

In the "Surge" phase, Ethereum's primary goal is to increase its transaction processing to over 100,000 transactions per second (TPS) while ensuring decentralization and stability. Additionally, certain L2 solutions will fully inherit Ethereum's core attributes such as trustlessness, openness, and censorship resistance. Vitalik also emphasized the necessity of maximizing interoperability between L2s to make the entire Ethereum ecosystem appear as a unified whole rather than many separate blockchains.

Advancements in Data Availability Sampling: Introduction of PeerDAS

In 2024, Ethereum introduced a technology called PeerDAS, a significant advancement in the "Surge" phase. PeerDAS aims to increase Ethereum's data bandwidth while maintaining decentralization. By allowing each node to download and verify only a small portion of the data, this technology enhances overall data availability. With the gradual implementation of this technology, Ethereum's transaction processing capacity is expected to reach around 58,000 TPS.

Data Compression: Further Efficiency Improvement

In addition to increasing data bandwidth, Ethereum is exploring data compression technologies to reduce the data space each transaction occupies. For example, Vitalik mentioned the possibility of replacing Ethereum addresses with shorter pointers and using signature aggregation technology to reduce transaction data volume. The combination of these technologies is expected to further enhance Ethereum's scalability.

Generalized Plasma Technology: Driving Off-chain Expansion

Vitalik also revisited Plasma technology, an off-chain scaling solution for blockchains. Unlike Rollup, Plasma stores data off-chain and verifies transactions using Merkle proofs. While early Plasma solutions were limited to simple payment applications, integration with SNARK technology has made Plasma more versatile, capable of handling a wider range of assets and applications.

Maturity of L2 Proof Systems: Moving towards Fully Trustless Solutions

Currently, most Rollup protocols are not truly trustless systems and often rely on security committees to prevent malicious transactions. Vitalik pointed out that the future goal is to rely entirely on cryptographic proof systems like ZK-SNARKs to eliminate reliance on third-party interventions and achieve true trustlessness.

Interoperability between L2s: Building a Unified Ethereum Ecosystem

Vitalik emphasized that interoperability between L2 protocols is a significant challenge that needs to be addressed in the future. Currently, transferring assets from L1 to L2 or between L2s often requires centralized trust bridges, undermining Ethereum's decentralization principles. In the future, Vitalik proposed various solutions to improve interoperability, such as Chain-specific addresses and Light clients, simplifying cross-chain operations and enhancing overall user experience.

Expanding L1 Execution Capacity: Maintaining Flexibility for the Future

While the success of L2 is crucial for Ethereum's future, expanding L1's execution capacity remains essential. Vitalik pointed out that if L2 fails, users still need to withdraw assets through L1 in emergencies. Therefore, L1 must maintain sufficient capacity to handle these potential contingencies. Additionally, enhancing L1's performance will strengthen the security and stability of the entire Ethereum ecosystem.

With the progress of Ethereum's "Surge" phase, the ecosystem is steadily moving towards large-scale expansion. Vitalik detailed the path of future technological developments and emphasized the goal of achieving hundreds of thousands of transactions per second while ensuring decentralization and security. Despite ongoing challenges, it also demonstrates that the Ethereum community is continuously advancing towards this grand objective.