Mapping The Appchain Ecosystem
This month, we explored appchains, which represent a more flexible, if technically complex, substrate than monolithic L1 chains. Below we’ve mapped the nascent ecosystem and highlighted a few teams enabling experimentation at the application layer.
- Arbitrum Orbit is a program that supports building and launching dApps on Arbitrum's L2 scaling solution, offering improved transaction speeds and lower costs.
- Avalanche Subnets are independent blockchains that can connect to the Avalanche network, allowing for scalable and interoperable dApp development. Subnets can be customized to meet the specific needs of dApp developers; for example, they can provide different levels of security or configurability.
- Celestia is a modular blockchain platform that aims to provide a secure and scalable foundation for decentralized applications. It’s composed of a set of stateless validators that coordinate to secure the network.
- Cosmos Zones are app-specific, customizable blockchains that can connect to the Cosmos Hub, allowing for cross-chain communication and shared security.
- EigenDA, built by the Ethereum middleware protocol EigenLayer, offers data availability oracles that can be used to connect dApps to external data sources.
- Espresso Decentralized Sequencer is a decentralized sequencer for rollups that aims to provide secure, high-throughput, and low-latency transaction ordering and availability. Currently, rollup sequencers are a centralized point of failure.
- OP Stack is a suite of decentralized infrastructure products built on the Optimism L2 scaling solution. It includes solutions for gasless transactions, bridging to other chains, and decentralized governance.
- Polkadot Parachains are use-case-specific chains that can connect to the main Polkadot Relay Chain, allowing for both cross-chain communication and shared security. Parachains are flexible, supporting a specific functionality or catering to a particular market.
- Polygon Supernets are independent blockchains connected to the Polygon Network, which aims to support an ecosystem of dApps with shared security. Supernets can be tuned to provide specific features, such as higher throughput or lower gas fees.
About Slow Burn
Weekly explorations into emerging crypto trends and how to navigate 2023 from the Slow Crypto Team, Sam Lessin, Clay Robbins, and Caroline Cline.