Cosmos, an interoperable blockchain ecosystem, has announced the launch of Stargate, a set of upgrades that brings significant new capabilities and performance improvements to blockchains built with the Cosmos software developer kit (SDK).
Among these upgrades is the highly anticipated Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC) protocol, delivering true interoperability by allowing blockchains to talk to each other — creating a new standard for cross-blockchain coordination and exchange.
“For the first time ever, blockchains will be able to trustlessly connect to one another; bringing in a new era of networked blockchains, much like how TCP-IP brought in an era of networked computers. IBC will have a transformative impact on the blockchain space by creating an ecosystem of politically independent chains that can interact via trade and information exchange. Knitting together many different blockchains can form a new crypto-economic system which is more resilient, efficient, and locally sovereign.”
– Christopher Goes, the lead developer of the IBC protocol
IBC provides the reliable backbone for a new token economy, permitting anyone globally to facilitate quick and secure exchanges across chains.
The Cosmos Hub is the first blockchain to support IBC in production. Stargate makes it possible for Cosmos SDK-based blockchains to incorporate the IBC Protocol, enabling communication with other compatible blockchains, and securely exchange data and token value across different blockchains.
Stargate
Other performance improvements released with the Stargate upgrade include:
- Support for the Protobuf serialization format
- Delivering increased efficiency and ease of use to streamline the blockchain developer experience; State Sync
- Reducing the full-node synchronization time to less than 30 minutes
- Automatic upgrades
- Facilitating the upgrade process and easing migration from one version to the next,
- Improved Light Client security that supports detection of new classes of misbehavior, dramatically increasing client and IBC connection guarantees.
Stargate is the largest software upgrade in Cosmos’ history and is a collaborative effort between seven distributed entities in the ecosystem. Based on decades of academic research, these teams have a shared vision to deliver an academic-based, verifiable, and reliable ‘Internet of Blockchains’.
This collaboration was spearheaded by the Regen, Interchain GmbH, Agoric, Tendermint Inc, Akash, Informal Systems, and Iqlusion teams.
Cosmos is a decentralized network of independent, scalable, and interoperable blockchains, with more than 200 projects in the Cosmos Tendermint ecosystem, 70 of which are running a mainnet. Focused on scalability and usability, Cosmos enables developers to rapidly and easily build blockchain applications.
By enabling blockchains to transact with one another, Cosmos creates a network of application-specific chains, spanning user-owned and operated platforms for decentralized finance (DeFi), social impact, privacy, gaming, as well as secure enterprise systems.
“The Stargate release is making the Cosmos ‘Internet of Blockchains’ a reality. Sovereignty and interoperability are no longer mutually exclusive and we are excited to welcome people into the Cosmos ecosystem so we may build the decentralized web together.”
– Ethan Buchman, Co-Founder of Cosmos