First Autonomous Massa Blockchain Smart Contracts Coming

The Massa project introduces new autonomous smart contracts to improve the blockchain trilemma of scalability, decentralization and security.

Originally developed in secret by three French researchers between 2017 and 2020, and only made public in the last 2 years, the Massa blockchain is finally emerging from the shadows and standing out.

The Massa team’s mission is to disrupt the blockchain ecosystem with several new innovations, including the first ever autonomous smart contracts.

It’s time for you to discover this new blockchain, which offers a new approach to solving the famous “trilemma” described by Vitalik Buterin, which summarizes the limitations that every blockchain faces: Scalability, Security and Decentralization.

Blockchain itself is a technology born in the 90s. It became quite popular in 2008 with the creation of Bitcoin by the famously anonymous Satoshi Nakamoto, the inventor of the decentralized, anonymous Peer-to-Peer value exchange model.

Then in 2015, Ethereum appeared on the scene, introducing the concept smart contractswhich executes transactions stored in the form of algorithmic instructions. Smart contracts recently facilitated the explosion of DApps (decentralized applications).

However, Ethereum, just like Bitcoin and all the blockchains that have emerged since, also relies on certain compromises between scalability (ie the volume of transactions that can be carried out by the network every second), security and decentralization.

In the case of Bitcoin and Ethereum, for example, it is at the level of scalability and decentralization (measured by NDC: Nakamoto Decentralization Coefficient) that the problem lies.

As the decentralization is partial, the scalability of networks is consequently reduced according to the interests of subsets of miners and validators. The difficulties Ethereum faces in moving from Proof-of-Work consensus to Proof-of-Stake is a perfect example of this.

This migration has been on the table for quite some time now, without anyone having managed to make it a reality yet.

True decentralization is at the heart of the Massa blockchain. From its inception, it has been designed around the concept of an unprecedented consensus, which is based on Proof-of-Stake but has the technological capacity to perform more than 10,000 validated transactions per second (scalability).

The test netdeveloped by an ever-growing community, leaves no doubt: the technical potential of this so-called Blockchain 3.0 is incredible.

In fact, several big names in the sector are already starting to talk about what could be the very first “complete” blockchain, which Web 3.0 enthusiasts have been anticipating for so long.

The decentralized and scalable blockchain.

Massa, the crypto-French touch

Massa was a research project started by three friends back in 2017: Sébastien Forestier, Damir Vodenicarevic and Adrien Laversanne-Finot. Sébastien, CEO, obtained a Ph.D. in artificial intelligence, and researched in particular in the field of robotics in the teams of Inria after a passage through ENS.

Damir, responsible for development and technology in the team, has a Ph.D. in theoretical physics. He won the gold medal at the IGEM competition in 2013 for his scientific research with genetically modified bacteria.

Adrien is responsible for the company’s strategy. Like Sébastien, Adrien is an Inria alumnus and has worked with development of several algorithms for robots to be exposed to unfamiliar environments to give them new skills.

It is in 2020 that the Massa project passed a significant milestone with the publication of a technical paper (Blockclique: Scaling blockchains through transaction sharing in a multi-threaded blockchain), as well as the foundation of the Massa Labs company.

The company organized a fundraising event that brought in 5 million euros last year, while, in order to maintain maximum decentralization, they took care to limit the maximum possible investment per address, individual or unit donor.

Around a hundred participants, individuals and organizations took part in the private sale.

A technical innovation

As can be seen in detail in it, since its inception**, Massa has some major innovations and a combination of concepts never before seen** in a blockchain:

• DAG (Directed Acyclic Graph) Multithreaded with a unique multi-chain system (32 chains running in parallel according to network needs)
• Evidence-of-effort-based blockchain protocol resistant to Sybil attacks
• A dedicated token that gives full control to the community (governance)
• Autonomous smart contracts

In July 2021, test net was launched, a kind of “beta version” off the main network (the official network), so the community can work on refining the platform sooner the main network launch.

At the same time, a medium blog was also launched, which allows the community to follow the technical progress and news surrounding the fair project, as well as the prizes won during presentations.

From the beginning of 2022, the Massa project is in its 12th phase test net:

• Over 6,900 validator nodes in the network
• +1000 validated transactions per second
• 95 blocks per second

At the moment, the French team behind Massa is composed of about 10 developers, spread over 5 different countries. All use Blockchain technology and the Rust programming language.

They execute the next steps in the roadmap, aiming to reach scalability of around 10,000 transactions per secondwith a delay of 0.5 sec for each block creation (ie 2 blocks per second).

Comparison of the different types of existing blockchains

Autonomous smart contracts

As explained by founder Damir Vodenicarevic, Massa was first founded to trying to solve the problems of decentralization and scalability that existing blockchains face. The team incorporated the idea of autonomous smart contracts when write their specifications.

In their view, a type of contract that executes without a transaction has long been overdue in the blockchain space. Such contracts offer extraordinary prospects for DApps and blockchain platforms. Damir sums it up like this:

“Why would you advocate decentralization when you continue to trust obviously centralized ways to interact with your smart contracts?”

But let’s look at what an autonomous *smart contract actually is.* Concretely, it is a smart contract who are able to perform at all times a predetermined operation on the blockchain.

For example, currently, the execution of a smart contract on Ethereum depends on a trigger in the form of a transaction on the blockchain.

Thanks to autonomous smart contracts, Massa reduces the need for robots or human interactionthus pushing through the limits of decentralization still present on other blockchains.

The best part: While it is possible to store more than just transaction or smart contract information on the Massa blockchain, it is also possible to store data on it, allowing everyone else smart contract to access it later, autonomously.

There is no other blockchain today that uses this type smart contract. Some infrastructures use centralized bots, but this approach is of course risky due to its centralized nature, especially in case of options liquidation.

Lots of project numbers

April 2022: The world’s first functional demo of autonomous contracts

Thanks to the autonomous smart contract and blockchain hosting of our web application, we are able to offer the first 100% decentralized DeFi experience. Such technological innovations allow us to offer fully autonomous execution of our users’ latent trade orders plus optimal liquidation management, all with increased security for our users.“

CEO of Dusa (AMM at Massa)

On April 13, 2022, the Massa Network team presented the first POC (Proof-of-Concept) of autonomous smart contractwhich was performed live in front of the audience at the Paris Blockchain Week Summit.

It ran on an autonomous smart contract on the same model as Conways’ Game of life. Several developers were then able to practice directly with this new blockchain tool during the Lyon hackathon, an event where the Massa team was also present.

Decentralization is not negotiable

Conclusion

Currently, the Massa blockchain is still under development. What is certain is that the French team in this great project enjoys proposing alternatives to the problems encountered across other ecosystems. Massa is a fully decentralized blockchain, controlled by thousands of people across the globe.

Thanks to its revolutionary multi-chain technology, the project leaders say they are ready for mass adoption. Regarding the transaction and block validation protocol, Massa comes up with a new solution to increase the security of the network.

But it is special within the area smart contracts that Massa really stands out. This technology brings the concept of decentralization, so fundamental in the world of cryptocurrencies and blockchain, a little closer to reality.

Disclaimer

All information on our website is published in good faith and for general information purposes only. Any action the reader takes on the information contained on our website is strictly at their own risk.