This Monday, Polygon launched its new zero-knowledge EVM public testnet, which the company describes it as “the next step for Ethereum”.
Throughout its existence, Polygon has cemented itself as one of the leading blockchains in the market. The company is one of the most efficient scaling tools and runs as a “layer-2” build on top of Ethereum.
Now, with the introduction of the visionary ZK Technology – Polygon aims to become the leading scalable layer-2 for Ethereum.
At ETHCC in Paris in July, the blockchain announced that its zkEVM public testnet will be launched this summer, with a mainnet deployment planned for early 2023.
Polygon’s newest tech will employ the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) for its “ZK rollup”, which means developers won’t have to learn new programming languages and can easily migrate their blockchain network from Ethereum.
These so-called “Rollups” are methods designed to overcome blockchain scalability difficulties in order to make transactions quicker and cheaper.
Zero-knowledge (ZK) rollups employ “proofs” to perform transactions in groups. These proofs are small chunks of encoded data that indicate the transaction is “true” and has not been tampered with.
ZK rollup development was long thought to be a long way off, but with Polygon’s announcement, as well as news from Matter Labs and Scroll that they are working on their own zkEVM projects, the emergence of this technology looks to be well on its way.
Among the new testers of the testnet will be some of the biggest Ethereum Virtual Machine Defi Platforms. Including Uniswap and Aave, and also Web3-based platforms such as Lens and the gaming producer Midnight Society.
What Are Ethereum Virtual Machines (EVM)?
The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) is the software that powers the Ethereum blockchain’s smart contracts. By merging ZK-rollups with EVM (zkEVM), developers can avoid learning new programming languages and will be able to simply migrate their smart contracts from Ethereum.
With the launch of the public testnet, some of the most popular decentralized financial (DeFi) platforms, such as Aave and Uniswap, as well as Web3 social network Lens, will be among the first protocols to use the zkEVM testnet.
