ZK Sync has a new name, but also new details about its growing constellation of connected chains.
What was once known as Hyperchains has been rebranded as Elastic Chain after a clash of trademarks, in conjunction with the ZKsync 3.0 network upgrade last month.
This network aims to address the challenges of liquidity fragmentation and frustrating user experiences that have plagued multi-chain ecosystems. ZK rollups built on the ZK Stack will gain native, minimized, and low-cost interoperability, according to a ZK Sync blog post.
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The core problem with existing multichain systems lies in their dependence on third-party bridges, even the best of which pose security risks and operational costs.
The Elastic Chain mitigates these issues through an architecture that emphasizes cryptographic security and seamless interoperability.
ZK Sync’s rebrand borrows from the economic concept of elasticity, where supply can increase proportionally to increased demand. To do this, the network of chains relies on recursive ZK proofs, allowing parallel proof generation and constant time verification. This means that the Elastic Chain can verify the validity of a calculation in a fixed amount of time, regardless of the size or complexity of the calculation.
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This feature is critical to the scalability of zk-rollups because it allows the network to process a large number of transactions without increasing the time or cost required for verification. More transactions can, somewhat counterintuitively, make the entire system cheaper.
Until a few months ago, placing transaction batches on the Ethereum mainnet was the main driver of layer 2 fees, but the new blob storage in EIP-4844, introduced in March and widely adopted in April, has radically changed the picture .
Role of the ZK token
The Elastic Chain consists of several key components, some of which will likely use the newly launched ZK token, such as the ZK Gateway.
Initially, the token’s role is one of governance, with decisions such as protocol upgrades, validator policies, and other critical aspects of the network’s development being put to the vote of the token holder. So far, ZK holders can delegate their vote to themselves or others, but actual board votes are still a way off.
The ZK Gateway would facilitate transaction settlement between connected ZK Stack chains more cheaply than settling directly with Ethereum. The gateway would be managed by a decentralized set of validators, incentivized to maintain the network’s resilience and reliability.
For example, bridging and state diff data charges – associated with the transfer and storage of the chain state differences (or ‘diffs’) – could be paid in ZK.
The blog post doesn’t explicitly call for this utility from ZK, but it is implied:
“Participation in this decentralized validation process requires an ERC20 token. ZKsync network management will designate a token for this purpose (it could be the ZK token for example),” the post said.
For users, the Elastic Chain network aims to emulate a single blockchain, using the same address and signature through modular smart accounts with passkeys.
Bridging the gap
ZK Sync’s Elastic Chain is most directly comparable to Polygon CDK and AggLayer, which also natively support verifiable shared interoperability.
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But according to tests published by Matter Labs, the lead developer of ZK Sync, Elastic Chain will do this with a TPS of 180, compared to Polygon’s 5.
That’s about the difference between a commercial airplane and a bicycle.
Of course, none of these solutions are actually live in production, so we’ll have to wait and see how they perform in real use. But for Web3’s early adopters plagued by constant Metamask RPC switching, latency, and bridge uncertainty, a streamlined experience can’t come soon enough.