Zksync Era: Scaling Ethereum with Zero-Knowledge Proofs and an Anticipated Airdrop
Introduction
Nothing is hidden about the growth of the blockchain technology. New technologies and platforms continue evolving every year. Decentralization, security and transparency are the core concepts of this technology. They are means through which transactions are recorded and verified. These shows it's potential to disrupt various industries, from finance to healthcare.
A very big challenge most of the current blockchains are facing is scalability. The network can become congested as more and more transactions are processed on the blockchain and this leads to slow transaction times and high fees especially Bitcoin and Ethereum networks. It has been a major hurdle for widespread adoption of blockchain technology.
To address this issue, several platforms have emerged with their own solutions to scale blockchain networks. A potential contender in this space is Zksync.
Zksync is a Layer 2 scaling solution for Ethereum, which uses zero-knowledge proofs to increase transaction throughput while reducing gas prices. It enables fast and cheap transfers of Ethereum tokens, making it more accessible and user-friendly. This project started in 2019 by Matter lab to offer unique solutions to the scalability problem in blockchain technology. A major upgrade was made this year from Zksync 2.0 to Zksync Era, it has been deployed on its mainnet and has already been integrated into several Ethereum projects, including Argent, Bitkeep wallet, Metamask.
While Zksync is focused on increasing transaction throughput and reducing gas costs. The native token of this project is currently not available, but the crypto community is anticipating an airdrop before the year ends. The token is something that has higher chances of blowing after the airdrop considering how they have achieved so far and also by comparing it to other layer 2 solutions that have already existed examples are Arbitrium and optimism, they all have their tokens trading above $1 as at the time of writing this. They raised a whooping 480 Million US dollars from 5 rounds of funding as of November 2022, this is one of the biggest fund raises in the history of cryptocurrency. Let's get to know more about this project in this blog.
About Zksync
Zksync is a scaling and privacy solution for Ethereum. It is Ethereum based layer 2 platform and uses zero-knowledge proofs to provide fast and cheap transactions. Zksync is designed to solve the problem of network congestion and high gas fees. It enables users to transact on Ethereum without worrying about high transaction fees and slow confirmation times. Through the new upgrade Zksync era, smart contracts can now be supported in the mainnet, this is the first zkrollup project to support smart contracts. It is now EVM compatible powered by the zkEVM. This means, all projects built on the EVM compatible blockchains such as Polygon, Avalanche, BSC can now be deployed to the Zksync Era.
But how does the zkSync Era work?
The main focus of the project is to improve the scalability of the Ethereum network which will make way for faster transactions and reducing gas fees. The protocol works by moving most of the transactions off-chain, thereby reducing the load on the Ethereum network.
To achieve this, the zkSync Era uses a technique called zero-knowledge proofs. This is a cryptographic technique that allows the zkSync Era to verify transactions without the need for the blockchain network to process them. By doing so, the protocol can execute many transactions off-chain, which significantly reduces the transaction fees and speeds up the transaction confirmation process.
The zkSync Era also utilizes rollups, which is another scaling technique. In order to decrease the number of transactions that must be processed on the Ethereum network, rollups combine several transactions into a single transaction. This reduces the strain on the network, enabling faster and less expensive transactions.Furthermore, the zkSync Era is highly secure thanks to the security model of the Ethereum Network.
Features and Benefits of Zksync
Scalability: Zksync scale up to 100,000 Transaction Per Second.
Low Transaction Fees: Zksync reduces transaction fees by up to 100 times compared to Ethereum's mainnet.
Security: Zksync uses zero-knowledge proofs to ensure that transactions are secure and private.
Interoperability: Zksync is interoperable with other blockchain solutions, making it easy to integrate with existing systems.
Comparison with other existing blockchain solutions
Zksync is not the only blockchain scaling solution in the market. There are several other solutions such as Plasma, Raiden, and Lightning Network. However, Zksync has several advantages over these solutions. Unlike Plasma, Zksync does not require users to exit the main chain to transact. With this, security is assured, and users are always in control of their funds. Compared to Raiden and Lightning Network, Zksync is more scalable and can process a higher number of transactions per second.
Zksync has several potential use cases, including:
Payment processing - Zksync can be used for fast and affordable payments, making it a viable alternative to traditional payment processors.
dApps - Zksync can be integrated with Ethereum-based dApps, enabling faster and more affordable transactions for users.
Gaming - Zksync can be used for in-game purchases and other transactions, making it an ideal solution for the gaming industry.
The Zksync Airdrop
In the first place, lets get to know what an airdrop is in crypto currencies. It is a marketing strategy used by blockchain projects to distribute free tokens to a large number of users. The aim is to raise awareness of the project and incentivize people to use its platform. In the case of ZkSync, the airdrop is designed to reward users who have supported the project and its mission to scale Ethereum. The Zksync team has so far not released a native token to support the project yet and have not released any plan for token release but an airdrop is anticipated by many crypto enthusiasts to occur by the end of this year. As a big project like this, there is going to be competition in the airdrop, so it is better to get yourself prepared to be eligible for such an opportunity.
Who is eligible for the airdrop?
There is no eligibility for crypto airdrops, everyone can participate but you only need to interact with the ecosystem to increase your chances of getting selected or qualified. For Zksync, they currently have two networks. That is the zksync lite and the, zksync Era. Interacting with both increases ones chances of getting selected for an airdrop in case they decide to do one this year. We all know Ethereum for its higher gas fees, this means some of your interactions in the network will require movement of funds around and this will require some gas fees. It's very hard to determine the amount that will be required at the end but according to one twitter thread I read recently, the author showed some of the ways to interact with the network and ended by estimating $70 for that action.
Let's look at some of the ways that one can interact with the two networks, Zksync lite and Zksync Era
Bridging funds across zksync networks. This is one of the ways to increase your eligibility for the airdrop. It involves sending funds like ETH, USDT or USDT from layer 1 chain to any of the zksync networks. You can do this through the zksync bridge or any of the Ethereum native applications like orbiter Bridge.
You can also trade on ZigZag DEX, the first DEX deployed on zksync. As a Layer 2 dex, fees are relatively as compared to others so the cost will not be exorbitant. This will also increase your eligibility for the airdrop. The only thing you need to do is to open the dex, connect your wallet and start trading.
zigzag dex
Mintsquare is another Dapp live in the Zksync network. You can visit the dapp, connect your wallet and start minting any nft you have. You can create your own NFTs and mint them to increase your chances.
Making gitcoin donation: Through the gitcoin platform, you can make donations to open-source projects you like. You can use the Zksync network for the donation. You will not spend much on transaction fees because of the lower fees of the Zksync network. Optimism, one of the Ethereum based layer 2 solutions included this in their eligibility and its likely to be in the Zksync too.
There are several projects already deployed on the mainnet. You can interact with any of them through the zkSync networks to increase your eligibility. One important thing to consider is to add the Zksync Era rpc to your wallet network and bridging some ETH funds to the Zksync wallet. You can add the the rpc through this link or by manual entry with the following details.
Network Name: zkSync Era Mainnet
RPC URL: https://mainnet.era.zksync.i o
Chain ID: 324
Currency: ETH
Conclusion
The zkSync Layer-2 protocol that uses zero-knowledge proofs to achieve fast and secure transactions on the Ethereum network. By moving some of the processing off-chain and onto Layer-2, zkSync is able to achieve much faster processing times and lower fees than traditional Ethereum transactions. With the continued development of Layer-2 solutions like zkSync, the future of blockchain scalability looks very promising indeed. The upgrade to the zkSync Era has added more functionalities making it standalone from other layer 2 and zkrollups. The ZkSync airdrop is a great opportunity to get free tokens and support a project that is working to scale Ethereum. The token have higher chances of blowing considering so many options and especially the potentials of potentials of Zksync and all the big and Successful projects that have migrated to the network.
Glossary: Leoglossary
Consulted sources and Further Readings:
zksync.io
ecosystem.zksync.io
coinmarketcap
zksync-airdrop-complete-guide
I hope you found this useful. I am Abdul-Salam Issahaku, from Ghana. I am a student web developer and a blockchain enthusiast. I blog about technology, life and investments. You can follow me to be part of my Hive family. Thank you for your time.
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