Author: Infrared Finance
Compiled by: TechFlow
In January of this year, Berachain’s Artio testnet went live, and the ecosystem has been steadily gaining momentum since then. Developers, users, and validator operators have all participated in testing, helping to stress-test the network and guide Berachain’s design decisions. The V1 testnet validated core concepts, such as Proof of Liquidity, but also found room for improvement, which is where V2 comes in. We will do our best to summarize the latest work from Berachain’s core developers.
A brief description
Validators are now required to stake 69,420 BERA instead of BGT to increase economic security.
BGT delegators will no longer be slashed.
All validating nodes have an equal chance to produce a block.
The maximum number of validator nodes has been increased to improve decentralization.
The core technology stack was changed from Polaris to BeaconKit to improve performance and EVM compatibility.
A public Infrared testnet deployment will be available soon.
What's new in V2
BERA staking and slashing changes
A key economic change in V2 is the introduction of a larger validator bond, which is the amount staked in BERA. In simple terms, the validator bond is the amount of tokens that a validator must stake to start producing blocks.
In V2, the validator deposit increases from a small amount of BGT to 69,420 BERA. This ensures that validators have a higher economic commitment, improving the security of the network by increasing the cost of potential attacks. This change means more responsibility for validators while increasing the utility of BERA without affecting BGT's role in liquidity proof.
The changes to BERA staking also impact validator slashing, which is a penalty for validators that misbehave or underperform. If a validator is slashed, a portion of the staked tokens will be deducted, which is an undesirable outcome.
In V1, slashing could affect both validators and BGT delegators. In V2, only validators’ BERA stakes will be slashed. This protects BGT delegators and places more responsibility on validators, ensuring that users and protocols have more peace of mind when using their BGT to participate in liquidity proofs.
Fairer block production
In V1, the chance of a validator producing a new block increased with the amount of BGT delegated to them. In V2, block production has been improved, all validators now have an equal chance to produce a new block, and the block reward will increase proportionally to their delegated BGT. This ensures a fairer reward distribution and encourages more validators to join the network, while still maintaining the importance of BGT delegation.
Maximum number of validator nodes
The maximum number of validator nodes has been increased from 100 to 128, and there may be more in the future. As we all know, increasing the maximum number of validator nodes can improve decentralization and network security. Decentralization is important!
Architecture upgrade
Finally, Berachain V2 migrates from the Polaris architecture to BeaconKit, which will improve network performance. BeaconKit allows the use of any Ethereum execution client, such as Reth, Geth, or Nethermind, making Berachain fully compatible with the EVM. This upgrade solves the bottlenecks encountered in V1 and ensures smoother transaction processing. If you want to learn more, read Dev Bear's technical blog on the subject.
How these changes affect Infrared
The changes introduced in V2 are a major step forward for the network. Berachain V2 will provide a better experience for users, developers, and validators, benefiting the entire ecosystem.
BGT's shift to a purely economic role strengthens the ecosystem built around iBGT by clarifying BGT's value proposition. We have seen many protocols adopt iBGT to build flywheels, and expect this trend to continue with the improved BGT design.
We are planning some exciting things regarding BERA staking for validators that we will share with you soon.
What's next?
We are working hard to complete the deployment of the new, public Infrared testnet and hope to make it available to users and partners as soon as possible.
