Solana is a high-performance blockchain platform known for its speed and low transaction costs. It uses a unique consensus mechanism called Proof of History (PoH) along with Proof of Stake (PoS), which allows thousands of transactions per second to be processed. Solana's native cryptocurrency is called SOL, which is used for transaction fees and staking within the network. The platform is designed to support decentralized applications (dApps) and decentralized finance (DeFi) solutions, making it a popular choice among decentralized applications.