What is Cysic Network? In the Mining 2.0 era, everyone can contribute computing power to earn tokens.

Cysic Network is the industry’s first decentralized validator network designed specifically for zero-knowledge proofs (ZK), providing the fastest and cheapest proof generation and verification services for ZK projects through proprietary ASIC chips and community GPU computing power. The network adopts a Proof of Compute consensus mechanism, combining the advantages of proof-of-work and proof-of-stake. Participants can earn token rewards by contributing computing power, staking tokens, or participating in governance.

Why ZK Proof Accelerators Have Become Essential

Zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP) are a cryptographic concept that allows one party to prove the truth of a statement to another party without revealing any additional information. This technology has various applications in the crypto field, such as constructing private blockchains, improving Layer 1 blockchain throughput, and facilitating communication between two independent blockchains. However, the generation of ZK proofs is extremely resource-intensive, requiring a large amount of complex mathematical operations, such as exponentiation, inversion, polynomial multiplication, and substantial data movement.

This high computational demand is reminiscent of Bitcoin mining, but ZK proof generation is even more complex. Traditional centralized solutions are costly and pose single-point-of-failure risks, while the concept of decentralized validators can offer a more robust solution. Cysic Network was created to address these two major pain points: validator decentralization, and the high latency and cost of proof settlement.

When Ethereum completes ZK proof settlement, both cost and latency are quite high. The current solution is to aggregate multiple proofs and then settle these aggregated proofs on Ethereum, which reduces the gas fee required for verification to some extent, but increases the waiting time. Cysic Network provides a satisfactory solution by moving ZK proof settlement off Ethereum, since this is essentially a near-stateless process.

How Proof of Compute Works

Cysic Network adopts an innovative consensus mechanism called Proof of Compute (PoC), which is essentially a probabilistic, Byzantine fault-tolerant consensus protocol. In simple terms, PoC achieves consensus by holding secret, fair, and verifiable leader elections in each epoch, during which several participants may be eligible to submit blocks to the chain based on fair and publicly verifiable criteria.

The blockchain is divided into multiple epochs, each containing a fixed number of blocks. To achieve consensus in each epoch, provers perform the following steps: first, based on the puzzle from the previous epoch, provers compete to solve it to form a committee. The committee includes a certain number of the fastest provers, who are responsible for proposing blocks during this epoch. Second, once the committee is formed, consensus for this period is achieved through the Cosmos SDK’s built-in PoS consensus mechanism, with stakes limited to committee members.

This design strikes a balance between efficiency, fairness, and decentralization. Compared to traditional PoW, PoC’s computational puzzles are not designed to consume energy, but to select the most capable provers. Compared to pure PoS, PoC ensures that committee members must possess actual computational capability, not just a large number of tokens.

Roles and Rewards of the Three Types of Participants in Cysic Network

Provers: Responsible for generating ZK proofs using powerful hardware such as GPUs and ASICs. They must stake a certain amount of $Token to complete proof tasks and are rewarded for producing valid ZK proofs. Rewards are distributed in $Token over a fixed period.

Verification Committee Members (VCM): Their job is to check the validity of the proofs produced by provers and to submit and vote on governance proposals. Due to the succinctness of ZKPs, the hardware used by verifiers may be much less powerful than that of provers. To qualify as a VCM, one must stake $Token tokens, with voting power proportional to the amount staked.

Agents: Their job is to relay proof tasks from ZK projects to the network and then return necessary information to the ZK projects. Initially, this will be handled by Cysic, but over time, it will become permissionless and require necessary token guarantees.

Dual-Token Mechanism and Governance Logic

Cysic Network adopts a dual-token mechanism, namely $Token and $veToken (governance token). $Token is the native token, used to pay transaction gas fees, block rewards, and staking rewards. $veToken is also the governance token and is non-transferable, obtainable by locking up $Token . A user’s voting power is proportional to the quantity of $veToken and the lock-up duration.

The voting function allows Cysic Network to capture the value of the entire ZK ecosystem. Provers and verifiers contribute computing power to pools, which in turn provide services to various ZK projects. Meanwhile, users can purchase $Token and lock up the token to gain voting rights to govern the compute pools. The allocation of computational power can be dynamically adjusted based on multiple key factors, one of which is the token reward yield provided by ZK projects.

The basic lock-up period for staking $Token is 6 months and can be extended to participate in reward distribution. The longer the lock-up, the more $veToken one can obtain. Different lock-up periods result in different $veToken ratios, which generally increase linearly. As the remaining lock-up time decreases, the amount of $veToken also gradually decreases. Participants can also choose to set automatic re-locking, in which case the remaining lock-up time of $Token remains fixed.

Three-Phase Testnet Roadmap

Cysic Network’s testnet consists of three phases, with each phase introducing a points reward system. The first phase launched at the end of July, providing basic network functionality, including a Cosmos-based blockchain, centralized task scheduling, project registration process, verifiers and validators, task verification tracking process, dashboard, blockchain explorer, and more. Users joining as verifiers will automatically receive rewards based on their verification contributions.

The second phase is expected to launch in early September 2024, with the main new feature being the computation proof mechanism. The introduction of the new consensus mechanism enhances security and decentralization. In this network, community members with significant computing resources can join as provers and verifiers and start earning rewards as computation resource providers.

The third phase is the final testnet before mainnet, expected to launch at the end of November 2024. Major new features include the task assignment process, permissionless network access, and voting functionality. Provers and verifiers will compute a verifiable random function to determine their eligibility for specific tasks. If the last testnet goes smoothly, the mainnet is planned to launch in early 2025.