Celestia, the first modular blockchain project, launched its mainnet on October 31st and airdropped its native token, TIA, to over 580,000 active users on the platform. The genesis airdrop distributed approximately 60 million TIA tokens, and on the same night, Celestia also listed on several centralized exchanges, including Binance, Bybit, Kraken, and KuCoin.
Following the listing of TIA trading pairs on major exchanges, the token price briefly surged to $2.99 per token before settling at around $2.28 per token at the time of writing, resulting in a market capitalization of approximately $321 million.
The TIA airdrop has been one of the most highly anticipated projects in the crypto industry over the past year, alongside Layer 2 project Arbitrum and Layer 1 project Sui. However, it is important to note that a large-scale airdrop does not guarantee project success. Two other highly anticipated projects, Aptos and Sui, experienced significant market capitalizations of $2.9 billion and $750 million respectively, but their Total Value Locked (TVL) on their respective blockchains did not exceed $100 million.
As the first project to develop modular blockchain technology, Celestia’s successful mainnet launch signifies a significant milestone in the advancement of blockchain technology.
Modular blockchain, also known as “LazyLedger,” is a concept that contrasts with monolithic blockchains. Monolithic blockchains, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, handle complex transaction processes across four layers: execution layer, settlement layer, consensus layer, and data availability layer.
Modular blockchains, on the other hand, focus on providing a single function as an auxiliary to other blockchains, rather than encompassing all four layers. This approach improves scalability and transaction processing speed by compartmentalizing blockchain functionalities, similar to a production line in a traditional car factory.
Modular blockchains differ from Layer 2 solutions in that they specialize in executing specific functions, while Layer 2 solutions aim to assist Layer 1 blockchains in processing more transactions. Layer 2 solutions achieve this by processing transactions off-chain and settling the final results on Layer 1, thereby improving transaction speed and reducing costs.
Currently, there is no clear distinction between modular blockchains and Layer 2 solutions within the developer community, and some analyses categorize Layer 2 as a type of modular blockchain. However, developers generally avoid rigid definitions to encourage diverse and innovative developments.
Celestia was born out of Mustafa Al-Bassam’s research paper titled “LazyLedger,” which reevaluated the operation of distributed ledgers and proposed the concept of assigning specific tasks to individual blockchains. Celestia, which focuses on solving the data availability layer problem, evolved from Mustafa’s “LazyLedger” concept.
Data availability refers to the publishing of block data within the blockchain network when a new block is generated. This allows other nodes to download and verify the data to ensure the absence of erroneous transactions. However, data publication consumes significant blockchain space, and downloading the entire blockchain data is challenging. Celestia addresses this problem by introducing data availability sampling (DAS), which enables lightweight nodes to sample and verify a portion of block data, reducing operational costs.
With an increasing number of lightweight nodes able to download and verify data, transaction processing speed can be improved without sacrificing decentralization or security.
Celestia’s mainnet launch represents a significant leap in blockchain technology, as it is the first modular data availability network to implement data availability sampling. As Layer 2 rollup blockchains, such as Arbitrum, Optimism, and zkSync, continue to grow rapidly, the need for efficient data storage and transmission solutions will increase. Celestia can serve as a substitute for Ethereum’s data availability, enhancing the processing efficiency and smooth operation of rollup networks without compromising decentralization and security.
While Ethereum currently handles an average of one million transactions per day and Solana’s transaction volume is lower, the user base of both blockchains has not yet reached a point where they are overwhelmed. However, as the number of users and transaction data size continue to grow, specialized technologies like Celestia may become the foundation of new blockchains.
Four years after the release of the LazyLedger whitepaper, Celestia’s birth signifies the realization of a seemingly unattainable goal. It is possible that in another four years, the widespread adoption of Celestia and other similar blockchain projects will become a reality.
Sources:
Coindesk, Celestia
