Guppy: Efficient Light Clients via Recursive Zero-Knowledge Proofs
Guppy lets blockchain light clients verify full state via recursive zero-knowledge proofs without validators maintaining state commitments, processing thousands of updates per second.
Guppy is a light-client protocol in which validators commit only to state updates while an off-chain, untrusted service secured by recursive zero-knowledge proofs maintains a verifiable Merkle tree over the full state. A hash-chain commitment moves validator signature verification out of the proving circuit, and a parallel recursive proving pipeline keeps latency growth logarithmic with throughput. A Plonky2-based implementation maintains a tree of size 2^30 while processing thousands of updates per second, adding only 2-4 seconds of latency without increasing block-construction complexity.
- Validators commit only to state updates, not full state trees.
- Off-chain service secured by recursive ZKPs maintains a verifiable Merkle tree.
- Hash-chain commitment moves signature verification out of the proving circuit.
- Plonky2 implementation handles 2^30-entry trees at thousands of updates per second.
- Proving latency grows only logarithmically; added latency is 2-4 seconds.
From the original article
1 min read at arxiv.orgTraditional light clients rely on validators committing to the entire blockchain state at every block via a state commitment such as a Merkle tree, allowing clients to verify facts using short proofs. However, maintaining large and ever-growing state trees imposes a significant burden on validators and lies on the critical path of block production.
By George Danezis · arxiv.org
A short excerpt; the article and its images belong to the publisher. Summary, key facts and assessment above are AI-written from the article and can be wrong.