The recent increase in demand for Bitcoin inscriptions has resulted in over 14GB of data being stored on the Bitcoin blockchain, leading to substantially higher costs. This highlights a critical need within the Bitcoin ecosystem: as the ecosystem expands, the inherent data throughput limitations of Bitcoin could become a bottleneck. Therefore, a data availability solution that adheres to Bitcoin’s core principles is necessary. In response to this need, Riema Labs has introduced Nubit, the first Bitcoin-native data availability layer, designed with the principle of trust minimization.

What is Nubit?

Nubit is a scalable and cost-efficient data availability layer secured by Bitcoin for the Bitcoin community. It enhances Bitcoin’s data capacities, supporting applications such as Ordinals, Layer 2 solutions, and price oracles, thereby expanding and improving the Bitcoin ecosystem’s scope and efficiency. 

Nubit consists of four essential components:

• Validators: These nodes use a consensus algorithm based on NubitBFT. They are responsible for proposing blocks and verifying the integrity of blocks and transactions. Nubit introduces a new consensus mechanism designed to support a large validator set (up to 200,000 nodes) to facilitate chain consensus.

• Full Storage Nodes: These nodes receive block data from validators and ensure the reliable storage of all data. Integrity and availability of stored data are critical, particularly against risks such as data withholding or tampering. Data Availability Sampling (DAS) requests from light clients are used to verify data availability, ensuring the system’s resilience.

• Light Clients: These clients obtain block headers broadcasted by validators, which include data commitments. They may randomly initiate requests to full storage nodes to verify data availability based on these commitments.

Nubit’s Data Availability Sampling (DAS)

As the validator set and block size increase, it becomes inefficient for every node to download entire blocks to ensure data availability. To address this, Nubit incorporates Data Availability Sampling (DAS) to enable network scaling with both full storage nodes and light clients.

Three types of nodes involved in DAS include:

Validator: Validators are tasked with executing the sampling protocol within the validator set. They will only sign the block header if the sampling protocol confirms data availability, ensuring the data’s presence within the validator group.

Full Storage Node: After a block is finalized, full storage nodes decode the block with the validator set and store it entirely. They also handle chunk requests from light clients.

Light Client: Light clients receive the block header from a validator and participate in the sampling protocol with a full storage node. If the protocol succeeds after sufficient sampling, the block is deemed available, and the full storage node’s reputation improves.

Nubit’s Light Node Quest

Light Clients only need to accept block headers from validators and request partial data from full storage nodes to verify data availability. Therefore, they are very suitable for ordinary users to run and use for viewing data on Nubit. Typically, the resource requirements for light clients can be met by a regular home computer.

As of June 24, Nubit has launched Phase 2 of their Alpha Testnet – the Light Node Quest. Lasting for a month, the quest implies the deployment of Light Nodes by community members, helping secure the network as it grows!

Blast Launches Nubit Node-as-a-Service Feature!

Nubit users can now join the Light Node Quest exponentially easier with Blast’s latest release: Node-as-a-Service for Nubit Network! This feature enables users to host their nodes on one of the leading infrastructure platforms in the Web3 space, with help from services that support some of the industry’s top projects.

Blast simplifies node deployment with its user-friendly interface and automated setup processes, making it easy to provision nodes quickly without requiring technical expertise. Our engineering team, with over four years of experience and an extensive portfolio, operates RPC nodes for more than 41 blockchain networks and validators for over 50 networks, managing a total value locked (TVL) exceeding $650 million.

If you’re an active participant in the Nubit ecosystem and are interested in their data availability layer solution secured by Bitcoin’s proven security, explore our NaaS packages, follow our social channels, and deploy your Nubit nodes with us!

For dedicated node support, our team of engineers is available 24/7 on the Bware Labs Discord server. Join the server via this invite link, get your “NaaS” role, and chat with one of our team members. We are more than happy to assist you in hosting and managing your Nubit nodes.