One-day in-person event with talks on Ethereum basic concepts, applications, and roadmap among the community of university students and young software developers in Lima, Peru.
Community & education
Ethereum.Rio
Conference organized in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which highlighted local builders and organizers while bringing in other web3 opportunities and companies.
Conference with topics and experiences related to software engineering and culture, inviting engineers to learn from one another and advance their careers.
Sessions discussing challenges and opportunities in token engineering and crypto-economic systems from many angles, based on writings of leaders in the space.
Development and maintenance of Beacon Fuzz, an Ethereum consensus-layer fuzzing framework, specifically targeting new Merge functionality.
Consensus layer
BLS External Signer using a Hardware Security Module
BLS External Signer using a Hardware Security Module (HSM). Aiming to complete full HSM staking prototype, get onto testnets, and get user/community feedback.
Formal specification and verification of the Distributed Validator (DV) protocol, which allows Ethereum validators to split their validator into multiple client instances for increased private key security and greater resilience against downtime and node operator attacks.
Expansion of login methods for the Interep reputation-proving service to include BrightID verification and clr.fund Contributor registration, as well as development of the onchain NFT ownership group using Semaphore.
Improvements to MACI (Minimal Anti-Collusion Infrastructure) including security against more potential attacks, integrating a better Proof-of-Identity mechanism, and building a minimum quadratic funding infrastructure, as well as developing a trusted setup solution.
Automated market maker demonstrating time-lock encryption as a core component to address Maximal Extractable Value in DeFi protocols, using Verifiable Delay Functions and ZK proofs.
Investigation into how to build an index hiding vector commitment that is memory efficient, aiming to provide a tool for SNARK applications needing one-time privacy preserving reveals.
Protocol using shared keys between two parties to send an encrypted authenticated request to a TLS webserver, allowing proof of provenance of web2 data without third-party access.
Implementation of EigenTrust, a reputation management algorithm for peer-to-peer networks, using the Halo2 proving system and the libp2p peer-to-peer networking framework.
Authentication that enables users to control their digital identity with their Ethereum account and ENS profile instead of relying on a traditional intermediary.
Review of code estimating timing of the next difficulty bomb, along with a public notebook running estimation and analyzing results for the next appearance of the bomb.
Execution layer
Dynamical Analysis of EIP-1559
Protocol research to obtain in-depth understanding of the EIP-1559 mechanism and explore possible variations or improvements, as well as the bootstrapping of a standalone research group that can perform top level Ethereum-centric research.
Prototyping solutions for out of band historical data retrieval on Ethereum, a prerequisite to implementing EIP-4444 which would reduce the historical data that Ethereum nodes need to store.
Development of definitive specifications for what constitutes a valid block or execution payload, in the form of a Python library written expressly for the purpose of clarity.
Development of the Fluffy ultralight client and contributions to Portal Network, aiming to enable resource-restricted devices to access and contribute to the Ethereum network without needing to sync the full state.
Funding for grants supporting research, development, and adoption of the Baseline protocol, which allows businesses to synchronize their systems of record and reduce costly errors in B2B transactions.
Indirect funding
Technical Challenges in Enterprise Ethereum
Continued exploration of issues and solutions for enterprise users of Ethereum in areas including decentralized identity, NIST standards alignment, Baseline protocol specification, and Layer 2 standards and specifications.
Development of an Ethereum-specific implementation of Dark Crystal, a social key recovery protocol using Shamir's Secret Sharing, building from the previous standalone implementation to one that integrates with existing wallets.
Support to execute the first round of DAO Drops, a retroactive public goods funding experiment that leverages on-chain data to empower participants to make fund allocation decisions.
Project-based learning repo that enables developers with basic skills to learn dApp development using actively used OS contracts, taught in English and Mandarin Chinese.
Monthly in-person meetups, weekly virtual talks in Spanish educating participants about Ethereum, and support with community activations during Devcon VI.
Monthly in-person meetups leading up to ETHWarsaw’s hackathon in September 2022. Attendees can learn from web3 engineers, exchange ideas, and network with like-minded blockchain enthusiasts.
Two-day virtual governance summit bringing together web3 governance practitioners and experts on governance and coordination beyond the crypto ecosystem.
Monthly in-person meetups hosted across Mexico and weekly virtual talks catered towards womxn. Topics such as the basics of web3, using L2s, and smart contracts will be covered.
Three-month program in Spanish teaching developers how to create their first dApps through online courses, live classes, group mentoring, and community events.
Ethereum education platform targeted towards the Chinese community, with a focus on community building, course development, connecting Ethereum with Chinese enterprises, and promoting Chinese government recognition of Ethereum.
Beacon chain network stress and scenario tests on cloud instances distributed across the globe. Initial development will assess viability, refine test tooling, and formulate a methodology for subsequent larger tests.
Continued development of Stereum, which enables solo stakers to install a beacon chain client and dependencies in a single setup with support for all production clients on testnet and mainnet.
Research in the field of privacy-enhancing technologies which seeks to bridge the gap between their theoretical specifications and the implementation of data sharing and analytics applications on Ethereum.
Support for Gitcoin’s GR13 ZK Tech side round, which focused on funding ZK applications, tooling, open-source contributions, and projects improving the usability of ZK technology.
Browser add-on which allows users to prove that HTTPS requests and responses originated from a given certificate subject through secure sockets layer (SSL) and transport layer security (TLS) cryptography.
Data collection on the performance and security characteristics of ZK circuits being verified on Ethereum, with the goal of displaying pertinent circuit information within chain explorer tools like Otterscan.
Browser plugin which enables ZK identity management and proof generation. Improving its functionality creating a Firefox version, enhancing UI/UX, and getting it ready for production.
Cryptography & zero knowledge proofs
ZK Proofs for Neural Net Classification and Accuracy
Project to design and implement ZK proofs for neural net classification, which would allow the owner of a neural net to reveal classifications or detections produced by a model from their private information without having to disclose that private information.
Open-source node deployment engine written in TypeScript that enables the easy creation of node deployment applications, with the goal of supporting all major execution and consensus layer clients.
Developer experience & tooling
Python-Simulation Engine & Testing Suite
Development of Python contract testing tool with a full suite of functionalities to serve as a primary testing library or companion to Hardhat/Foundry with optimized backtesting and parallelized chain simulations.
Developer experience & tooling
SolidiKeY - Solidity Asset Flow Verification at Scale
Solidity verification tool based on the KeY project verification system for Java with an emphasis on usability, scalability, and functional correctness properties specifying the relation of the asset flow with contract data.
Developing a Python implementation of Ethereum, that will serve as an executable specification for the execution layer. The specification is a Python implementation of Ethereum that prioritizes readability and simplicity.
Infrastructure improvements for ETH.LIMO, a decentralized gateway for resolving ENS records and associated IPFS content.
Total awarded in Q2: $8,255,293.37
Are you working on something you think could change Ethereum for the better? Head to our grants page to learn more about what we look for in the projects we fund.