ZKsync’s Airbender zkVM Proves Ethereum Blocks in 35 Seconds

Matter Labs, the developer firm behind the layer-2 network ZKsync, unveiled at the Permissionless conference its new cryptographic prover “Airbender” on Tuesday.

A prover is a key component for layer-2s, as it generates zero-knowledge proofs that are then posted to the base layer blockchain (in this case Ethereum) — a crucial process in linking the two chains and ensuring its security.

The ZKsync team claims that Airbender is the fastest of its kind, delivering Ethereum block proofs in 35 seconds with a single GPU, outpacing its competitors benchmarks.

Having fast speeds can save on transaction fees: “we’re entering fraction of a cent territory which is critical for key use cases, including micropayments, high-frequency trading, and decentralized social,” said Alex Gluchowski, the co-founder of Matter Labs, in an interview with CoinDesk. “Faster proofs unlock faster finality, cheaper apps, and crucially, proofs that can be generated anywhere, not just in massive GPU farms.”

The new prover, which is an open-sourced zero-knowledge virtual machine (zkVM), is based on RISC-V, a newer programming framework that Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has suggested to replace the current EVM, because .

“We started building ZKsync Airbender over a year ago because we saw where Ethereum needed to go, and what ZK apps would eventually demand,” said Gluchowski. “Vitalik’s recent post was a great affirmation of our plans, but this path has been in motion for a while.”

While Airbender is still early in its rollout, Matter Labs has released an app that lets developers test out the new prover. If all goes according to plan and the ZKsync governance process approves it, Airbender will be included in a protocol upgrade later this summer, according to Gluchowski.

“ZKsync Airbender proves Ethereum blocks in 35 seconds using a single GPU. That’s the start of something ground-breaking: home-proving, real-time cross-chain UX, and ZK apps that can verify on the fly. This is the foundation for an Internet of verifiable, interconnected chains,” Gluchowksi said.

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