TVL Surpasses $3 Billion: Explore Zircuit, the EVM-Compatible ZK Rollup Network
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TVL Surpasses $3 Billion: Explore Zircuit, the EVM-Compatible ZK Rollup Network
Zircuit was developed by a team that received multiple research grants from the Ethereum Foundation and is supported by Pantera Capital and Dragonfly Capital.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: Zen, PANews
In April, the staking program launched by Zircuit, an EVM-compatible ZK Rollup network, experienced significant growth, with its TVL increasing from $1.1 billion to a peak of $2.8 billion during the month. According to DefiLlama data, as of May 6, deposits into Zircuit staking have reached $3.2 billion.
What is Zircuit?
Zircuit was developed by a team that has received multiple research grants from the Ethereum Foundation and is backed by Pantera Capital and Dragonfly Capital. On November 9 last year, Zircuit's public testnet officially launched. Being fully EVM-compatible means that Ethereum applications can be seamlessly deployed on this network without needing to learn new programming languages or frameworks. This compatibility allows users to enjoy the new features, speed, and cost advantages of these dApps without having to learn anything additional.
In February this year, Zircuit introduced its staking program, gradually drawing public attention. It enables users to stake ETH, liquid staking tokens (LSTs), and liquid restaking tokens (LRTs) to earn rewards including staking APR, restaking APR, EigenLayer points, LRT points, and Zircuit points. Currently, Zircuit has partnered with prominent projects such as Ethena, Ether.fi, Renzo, EigenLayer, Lido, and Swell. Unlike hard-locked models like Blast and Mantle, Zircuit allows users to withdraw funds at any time while retaining earned points and yields, similar to a demand deposit.
Currently, Zircuit remains in the testnet phase, with its mainnet expected to launch as early as this summer. With anticipated airdrops, users can participate in testnet activities, join the "Build to Earn" program, or engage in its staking initiative—staking ETH and its derivatives or completing various tasks to accumulate Zircuit points for potential future token rewards.
Core Feature: Sequencer-Level Security
Zircuit itself is an Ethereum ZK Layer 2, whose primary innovation lies in introducing Sequencer-Level Security (SLS). This mechanism aims to provide enhanced security, ensuring users' assets and data are fully protected when conducting transactions on the Layer 2 blockchain, preventing malicious transactions and hacker attacks. Additionally, its design minimizes impact on sequencer performance, particularly regarding throughput and latency, maintaining network efficiency and responsiveness. Its transparent operational mechanism ensures that the blockchain state can be clearly defined and derived, guaranteeing network predictability and stability.
Specifically, Zircuit’s sequencer monitors the mempool—the collection of unconfirmed transactions—for malicious activity. SLS uses specific algorithms or techniques to determine whether a transaction has malicious intent. If identified as malicious, the transaction is placed in quarantine and temporarily excluded from block inclusion. Only after meeting release conditions—once legitimacy is verified—can it be considered for inclusion in a block. SLS may also adopt a hybrid parallel-sequential approach for malicious detection, optimizing both speed and accuracy by combining parallel simulation at the chain tip with sequential simulation within blocks, leveraging the strengths of each method.
Beyond SLS, another distinguishing feature of Zircuit is its proprietary proof aggregation technology, which breaks down circuits into fast parallel processes to enhance processing speed and efficiency.
Hybrid-Architecture ZK Rollup
By integrating proven Rollup infrastructure with zero-knowledge proof technology, Zircuit adopts a hybrid-architecture ZK Rollup solution. Its architecture includes sequencers responsible for processing transactions and building L2 blocks, provers tasked with generating validity proofs for these blocks, and smart contracts that interact with the system on L1.
Zircuit’s transaction flow can originate either from L1 or directly from L2. Transactions are processed through Rollup nodes—including sequencers, execution engines, and batch processors—where the sequencer instructs the execution engine on which transactions to include in a block, and the batch processor submits batches of L2 transactions to L1 to ensure full data availability. The execution engine processes transactions within the batch and generates a new L2 state. These L2 blocks are then handled by Zircuit’s provers, each with specific roles, enabling rapid proof generation and verification.
Regarding deposits, withdrawals, and transactions: deposit transactions involve bridging assets such as ETH or ERC-20 tokens from Ethereum to Zircuit, while L2 transactions are initiated on Zircuit, such as transferring ETH between accounts or invoking smart contracts on Zircuit. These transactions are processed by Rollup nodes and eventually included in L2 blocks, later validated through proofs. Withdrawal transactions move assets (e.g., ETH) from Zircuit back to L1, initiated by sending an L2 transaction to Zircuit’s L2 standard bridge smart contract. Once included in an L2 block, the corresponding proof is used on L1 to finalize the withdrawal, ensuring the recipient account holds sufficient assets.
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