Celestia (TIA) leverages various proprietary technologies to improve performance and scalability without sacrificing security. The network is among the first modular data availability blockchains to focus on providing DA services to rollups. Here’s everything you need to know about Celestia.
What Problems Does Celestia Attempt to Fix?
Celestia helps to relieve multiple pain points in the blockchain sector due to its unique structure, ease of use, and consensus. Celestia was designed from day one to eliminate technical barriers to adoption. The protocol streamlines the creation of both blockchain assets and entire networks.
Limitations of Monolithic Blockchains
Monolithic blockchains are the most common type of network in use today. These networks conduct both consensus and smart contract execution on the same layer. As such, there is a rigidness that means a single consensus layer must perform every action. As such, it ends up being good at everything but not excellent at anything.
Modular blockchains separate tasks into layers of their own. These blockchains are ideal for creating new networks because they can leverage Celestia as a data availability (DA) layer.
This structure enables roll-ups to leverage Celestia’s security while providing uniformity across the ecosystem. It also means that modular blockchains are ideal for supporting task-specific systems since the execution, settlement, and consensus require DA to function efficiently.
High Gas Prices
Celestia helps to lower gas costs for developers. For example, the network’s use of separate layers enables developers to reduce operating costs for on-chain data-intensive dapps. This feature is crucial for large participation dapps such as public voting systems.
Lack of Scalability
Scalability remains a major market concern as recent congestion has once again pushed gas prices higher on many major blockchains. Celestia resolves these issues in multiple ways. For example, it decouples the execution from consensus layers. This structure enables the network to scale sustainably while avoiding issues such as state bloat.
Benefits of Celestia
There are many reasons why a developer or business would want to explore Celestia’s offerings. The network’s scalable blockchain architecture remains secure as it expands. Additionally, there is a strong focus on developer needs. For example, developers can leverage multiple VMs (virtual machines) when creating dapps and networks.
Sovereign Roll-Ups
Celestia supports sovereign roll-up technology. A sovereign rollup possesses the scalability and security of a roll-up network but the sovereignty of a layer-one blockchain. As such, developers can create self-governing chains that can support specific enterprise-grade tasks with reduced risk. The network’s modular structure means that the stack can be arranged in any order to better serve the Dapp’s needs.
Active Community
Another benefit that continues to help Celestia expand is its strong community. This community makes it easier to connect with others and collaborate on new projects. It also puts you in contact with developers and other key personnel on the project.
How Does Celestia Work?
Celestia is a Cosmos-based network built with Cosmos SDK. The platform supports a wide range of functionality due to its structure. Notably, Celestia operates as a base layer for application-specific networks and dapps. As such, its main task is to guarantee data availability and order transactions. This structure means that settlement and execution occur on their own layers which improves the ability to optimize tasks.
Light Nodes
One of the core components of Celestia is the use of light nodes. These resource-limited nodes are tasked with downloading the block headers and commitments. As such, they only need to sample minimum data from a block to complete their verification requirements. This architecture improves the network’s data capabilities without lowering security.
Data Availability (DA) Layer
Celestia’s data availability layer is designed to support sampling. Data availability sampling (DAS) is a process that enables light nodes to verify that certain data is available without having to download the complete block. Consequently, DAS is a powerful tool that reduces congestion significantly.
Namespaced Merkle Trees (NMTs)
The Namespaced Merkle tree protocols used in Celestia assist in its scalability. These systems help to reduce computational power by allowing the settlement and execution layers to skip over relevant data during the download process.
Blobspace
The Blobspace is where developers go to publish data on the Celestia platform. Developers submit this data and pay a small fee using the network’s utility token TIA. Interestingly, every blob includes a namespace, the data to be made available to the network, a commitment to the data, and a payment execution transaction.
Token – TIA
The native token of the Celestia blockchain is TIA. This token has a 1,000,000,000 supply set at Genesis with 141M tokens in circulation. According to the project’s tokenomics, the majority of TIA remains locked up until October 2024.
TIA serves a vital role in the creation of new assets and networks in the Celestia ecosystem. Additionally, it streamlines the creation of new systems. For example, developers can bootstrap and use TIA in Dapps rather than create new tokens.
Consensus
Celestia is a Delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPoS) network. This type of blockchain eliminates the use of miners. Instead, users stake or delegate their tokens to validators to participate in the consensus mechanism. This approach provides better scalability and sustainability compared to PoW networks.
Governance
Celestia users can have their voices heard using the network’s community governance mechanism. Community governance systems are a popular way to help steer the direction of a project. Celestia users can stake their tokens to gain the ability to put forth proposals for a community vote.
History
Celeste launched recently and has seen slow growth in terms of network usage since it entered the market. However, the project has seen significant interest from traders. According to CoinMarketCap data, the project’s trading volume hit $900M in 24 hours which placed it in the top spot across the market briefly.
Bottom Line
Celestia is a great example of how creative developers can help solve some of the major issues faced by previous networks. The decision to structure Celestia as a DA network to support the growing number of roll-ups in the market demonstrates the amount of research and time put into the project. For these reasons and many more, Celestia is a platform worth watching.
