You are reading an excerpt from our free but shortened abridged report! While still packed with incredible research and data, for just $20/month you can upgrade to our FULL library of 50+ reports (including this one) and complete industry-leading analysis on the top crypto assets. 

Becoming a Premium member means enjoying all the perks of a Basic membership PLUS:

• Full-length CORE Reports: More technical, in-depth research, actionable insights, and potential market alpha for serious crypto users
• Early access to future CORE ratings: Being early is sometimes just as important as being right!
• Premium Member CORE+ Reports: Coverage on the top issues pertaining to crypto users like bridge security, layer two solutions, DeFi plays, and more
• CORE report Audio playback: Don’t want to read? No problem! Listen on the go.

Polygon Avail

Avail addresses the challenges nodes face when processing malicious or incomplete data, which is referred to as a data availability problem. Rollups handle transactions off-chain and then post their batches to the Ethereum mainnet as calldata for efficiency reasons. Therefore, a rollup requires there to always be enough room on the L1 for their data to guarantee L1-level security. Data Availability (DA) refers to a measure of how often data is available to be used, typically referring to Ethereum L1 data availability (space) for rollups. 

Data availability is critical in this regard because as long as all of the execution data is made available on the mainnet, the chain doesn't require every node to execute every transaction to validate transactions and reach consensus. Avail only stores Ethereum’s calldata tracking changes to the Ethereum state machine and doesn't support smart contracts or applications, essentially serving as a specialized data availability chain. “Data Availability (DA) Layers” are chains built to serve solely as a DA/shared security layer for rollups by specializing in ordering transactions and maximizing the DA capacity. In most cases, they generate a proof for L1 clients that (essentially) guarantees confirmation that all block data has been published on-chain. Polygon Avail and Celestia are examples that only provide high data capacity; the rollups simply optimize execution.

Existing Blockchain Architectures in Polygon Avail, Source: Polygon

Specialized DA layers are the latest form of modular blockchain design. They use the base idea of ETH 2.0’s DA layer, but steer it in a different direction. The pioneering project on this front is Celestia, but newer solutions, such as Polygon Avail, are also heading in this direction.

Similar to the DA shards of ETH 2.0, Celestia acts as a base layer that other chains (rollups) can plug into to inherit security in DA sampling (without centralization).

As with all designs, specialized DA layers also carry some drawbacks. One immediate drawback is the lack of a default settlement layer. As such, to share assets with each other, rollups will have to implement methods to interpret each other’s fraud proofs.

Polygon sees Avail as the data solution across Ethereum’s multi-chain ecosystem. Due to its nature, Avail can support all aspects of the ecosystem, from monolithic chains to modular chains. Those using Supernets via Polygon Edge are also included in this process. Avail itself is a standalone solution that doesn't support additional applications being built on top of it, nor additional smart contracts. The existence of Avail is meant to simply sequence and store data to ensure that data remains available, uncensorable, and immutable via a sampling process.

In June 2022, Polygon Avail went live on testnet. Furthermore, Avail has been vetted by Halborn Security, an industry-leading cybersecurity firm that conducts investigations and full audits of blockchain systems. Halborn was tasked with identifying potential code vulnerabilities or security concerns within Avail, evaluating risk parameters, and determining the extent to which risk may be associated with the system. Upon completion of their investigation, Halborn did find some (mostly) minor areas for improvement, which Polygon has since identified and acknowledged.

To read the entire FREE report, click here.