Kartik Nayak
@kartik1507
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Associate Professor, Duke University | Espresso Systems | https://t.co/19Cm6tO2jU | Blockchains and Applied Cryptography
Joined March 2009
Test your understanding of the basics of fault tolerant distributed computing https://t.co/0vjYbK4IoL
decentralizedthoughts.github.io
The goal of this post is to motivate you to learn the basics of distributed computing by providing a set of simple questions that test your understanding of the basic definitions. In 2025, LLM-based...
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Excited that our paper Optimistic, Signature-Free Reliable Broadcast and Its Applications received a distinguished paper award at ACM CCS 2025. with @nibeshrestha2, Qianyu Yu, @giuliano_losa, @aniketpkate, @wang_xuechao
We got one of the distinguished paper awards! Congrats to the whole team!
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Watch out for the talk by @giuliano_losa on our paper, Optimistic, Signature-Free Reliable Broadcast and Its Applications, at @acm_ccs 2025. We introduce a signature-free Reliable Broadcast (RBC) protocol that achieves 2-step termination under optimistic conditions (vs. 3-step
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Today at AFT @Tim_Roughgarden will talk about our paper "Beyond Optimal Fault-Tolerance", where we analyse how "recovery procedures" can be used increase the resilience of blockchain protocols beyond the standard impossibility bounds. Here's the paper:
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Later today at AFT, Jovan Komatovic will talk about our paper "From Permissioned to Proof-of-Stake Consensus". The paper gives a generic wrapper that takes any permissioned blockchain protocol and turns it into proof-of-stake version (inheriting fundmental properties of the
eprint.iacr.org
This paper presents the first generic compiler that transforms any permissioned consensus protocol into a proof-of-stake permissionless consensus protocol. For each of the following properties, if...
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ZK Tech and the Future of L2s panel at KBW brings together three companies building essential infrastructure for Web3's future. @benafisch (our co-founder/CEO) joins @pumatheuma, founder of @SuccinctLabs, and @sandeepnailwal, founder of @0xPolygon, to discuss their projects and
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What are some of the conceptual contributions made in the DAG consensus line of work? Read our post on Decentralized Thoughts:
decentralizedthoughts.github.io
Since 2018, blockchain research has seen a surge in DAG-based BFT protocols aimed at achieving higher throughput. These protocols trace back to Hashgraph, 2018, Aleph, 2019, the theoretical work of...
1/ Decentralized thoughts on DAGs With Neil Giridharan and @kartik1507
https://t.co/GEfRyGO4gl
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In fact you can get the optimal 5f-1 (or more generally 3f+2p-1) https://t.co/ulLaLQ2M6S
decentralizedthoughts.github.io
In our previous post, we described a 2-round partially synchronous BFT protocol for $n = 5f+1$. In this follow-up post, we push the bound to $n = 5f-1$, achieving optimal 2-round commit in the...
Decentralized thoughts on Concurrent 2-round and 3-round Simplex-style BFT with @ElodinStorm , @kartik1507 , and Ling Ren https://t.co/lGdn0N3BPO
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Looking forward to speak at the Science and Engineering of Consensus workshop on Sunday in Berkeley. I'll talk about recent work with @kartik1507 and @nibeshrestha2 on our "Pipes" model for analysing blockchain protocols. One of the advantages of the model is that it actually
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Generally great to see some takes on Glamsterdam. But a few thoughts on FOCIL: > "its censorship benefits do not extend to 99% of transactions known to be excluded by block builders today." I don't think that's fair or accurate: - Today, 60% of transactions still go to the
dune.com
Dune is the all-in-one crypto data platform — query with SQL, stream data via APIs & DataShare, and publish interactive dashboards across 100+ blockchains.
I partnered with @Data_Always to provide our MEV perspective on the Glamsterdam upgrade. TLDR: While BALs are uncontroversially good for the EL, there is no standout candidate for the CL. Every option has clear pros & cons, some of which surprised us. https://t.co/T33AZU3GKo
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More frequent batch posts to the L1 = faster, secure confirmations. Faster, secure confirmations = 1. More efficient use of liquidity due to reduced risk exposure window --> more volume bridged at a single time at (potentially) lower prices. 2. Faster withdrawal times to the
0.31 gwei basefee is crazy. rollups should consider taking this opportunity to post data and proofs more often to offer a better ux to their users, especially @zksync @Starknet @LineaBuild @Scroll_ZKP @inkonchain @soneium @modenetwork
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Use this form to nominate someone (including yourself) to be part of the ACM CCS 2026 Program Committee. https://t.co/kJtqHUbGrM
docs.google.com
Use this form to nominate someone (including yourself) to be part of the ACM CCS 2026 Program Committee. Question marked with (*) are mandatory. Nominations should preferably be made before September...
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Decentralized thoughts on 2 round BFT in Simplex style With @ElodinStorm and Ling Ren https://t.co/jluSVN7nMU
decentralizedthoughts.github.io
Simplex is a recent partially synchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerant (BFT) protocol that is gaining popularity. We take this opportunity to rehash several classic results in the Simplex style. The...
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Encrypted mempools can seem like an appealing solution to fixing the market structure on blockchains. But, even a perfect cryptographic solution still leaves a lot of gaps. We’re going to need new economic mechanisms in addition to cryptography to totally address the problem.
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Fast finality for reliable broadcast, asynchronous verifiable secret sharing (AVSS), asynchronous verifiable information dispersal (AVID), and blockchains while maintaining optimal fault tolerance of 33%! paper: https://t.co/c7zxkOhub9 Now, all these primitives can be
arxiv.org
Reliable broadcast (RBC) is a key primitive in fault-tolerant distributed systems, and improving its efficiency can benefit a wide range of applications. This work focuses on signature-free RBC...
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Combining avenues (A) and (B): Hydrangea, our new paper ( https://t.co/ZG5nbFKeYD) with @nibeshrestha2 and @aniketpkate Lower bound 5: There exists no partially synchronous Byzantine broadcast protocol that tolerates f Byzantine faults and c crash faults for n = 3f + 2c + k + 1,
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Avenue (B): achieve better good-case latency when there are fewer Byzantine faults Lower bound 4: We need n >= 3f + 2p - 1 to tolerate f Byzantine faults and achieve a 2-round good-case latency when p <= f ( https://t.co/hjR9cQO4d8,
https://t.co/2VkGFmcZv0) Upper bound: FaB,
decentralizedthoughts.github.io
Guest post by Zhuolun Xiang State Machine Replication and Broadcast Many existing permission blockchains are built using Byzantine fault-tolerant state machine replication (BFT SMR), which ensures...
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Two avenues to improve: (A) tolerate more crashes, (B) achieve better good-case latency when there are fewer Byzantine faults Avenue (A): tolerate more crashes Lower bound 3: We need n >= 3f + 2c + 1 to tolerate f Byzantine faults and c crash faults under partial synchrony
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A thread summarizing research on the good-case latency and resilience of partial synchrony protocols. Lower bound 1 (DLS): It is impossible to solve agreement under partial synchrony against a Byzantine adversary if f >= n/3. ( https://t.co/xCFUNXSlfX) Lower bound 2 (Good-case
decentralizedthoughts.github.io
Lower bounds in distributed computing are very helpful. They prevent us from wasting time on impossible tasks :-). More importantly, they help us focus on what is optimally possible or how to...
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