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Near Protocol: Sharding Design

The Near Protocol whitepaper describes a sharded blockchain design aimed at achieving high scalability while maintaining a user-friendly developer experience. T

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Abstract

The Near Protocol whitepaper describes a sharded blockchain design aimed at achieving high scalability while maintaining a user-friendly developer experience. The core of the proposal is “Nightshade,” a sharding approach where each block contains transactions from all shards, but participants only need to process the shards they are involved with. This design simplifies the state management complexity inherent in most sharding proposals by avoiding the fragmentation of the ledger. The protocol utilizes a Proof-of-Stake mechanism combined with an innovative sharding strategy to ensure that the network remains secure even as the number of nodes increases. By focusing on state sharding and efficient cross-shard communication, Near enables a flexible platform for decentralized applications. This document outlines the structural choices behind a sharded L1, detailing the balance between validator load, system throughput, and data availability, representing a major milestone in scalable blockchain design. Authors: Illia Polosukhin, Alex Skidanov Publication: Project Whitepaper Publication date: 2019-01-01

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Key findings

  • Introduces Nightshade as a sharding solution for blockchain scalability.
  • Simplifies cross-shard interaction by managing state in a unified ledger.
  • Utilizes PoS to maintain security in a sharded environment.
  • Balances validator workload for high-throughput operation.

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Citation

Illia Polosukhin, Alex Skidanov (2019). Near Protocol: Sharding Design. Project Whitepaper. https://near.org/papers/the-near-whitepaper/
Canonical knowledge ID: research:near-protocol-sharding-design