Introduction
One of the top crypto assets, Ethereum, has been making headlines due to its ongoing steps that will follow up to The Merge. With the merge, the Ethereum blockchain is taking its step toward shifting from the current Proof of Work consensus mechanism to the Proof of Stake consensus mechanism. Yesterday, the tenth Shadow Fork that was supposed to be happening on 28 July, 2022, took place 26 hours before its scheduled time. This step was yet another cautionary step to set up the next batch of changes that the merge will integrate for the consensus shift.
The transition of the Ethereum Blockchain to the Proof of Stake consensus mechanism started in 2020, with the launch of the Beacon chain. The Beacon chain was Phase 0 of the three part phase protocol in place for the merge to be completed. The current ongoing phase is Phase 1 of the merge and was previously announced to be completed by 2021. However, due to various blockers like a number of delays and a few of the unfinished work from the developers. The Phase 2 is now set to be completed by the third week of September along with the final stage, which is to be completed by the end of 2023, as reported by a CoinTelegraph report.
Additional Read: Ethereum Price Reached Above $1666 after the Announcement of the Shadow Fork
What is Happening with Ethereum’s Merge?
As reported in the CoinTelegraph News, “lead Ethereum developer Tim Beiko took to Twitter to announce the details of the Goerli testnet transition. The Goreli testnet will merge with the Beacon Chain called Prater and the combined Goerli/Prater network will retain the Goerli name post-merge.”
📢📢📢 Goerli/Prater Merge Announcement 📢 📢📢
Prater will run through the Bellatrix upgrade on August 4th, and merge with Goerli between August 6-12th: if you run a node or validator, this is your last chance to go through the process before mainnet 🚨https://t.co/JAz5AJe12B
— Tim Beiko | timbeiko.eth 🐼 (@TimBeiko) July 27, 2022
The Goerli testnet merger will be completed in two phases starting from August 4, 2022, with the Bellatrix upgrade on the consensus layer. This Bellatrix upgrade of the Goerli testnet merger will be triggered by the epoch height of 112260.
Did You Know? Ethereum’s Proof of Stake network progresses in epochs instead of blocks, where one epoch is a bundle of up to 32 blocks.
The second phase of the Goerli testnet merger upgrade will be called Paris. During this phase, the execution layer will transition from a proof of work (PoW) to a proof of stake consensus mechanism. The upgrade of the Paris phase is expected to be completed between August 6, 2022 to August 22, 2022. The Paris upgrade will be triggered by a specific Terminal Total Difficulty (TTD) of 10790000. Once the execution layer crosses the TTD threshold, the next block on the ETH blockchain will start to be solely produced by a Proof of Stake validator.
Read more on Ethereum Merge
The Official Merge Announcement
The official announcement of the Goerli testnet merger mentioned that the upcoming Goerli merge will be different from the early testnet integration since the node operators need to update both their consensus layer and execution layer clients in tandem, rather than just one of the two. The developer team also attached numerous client releases that support the testnet Merge.
The CoinTelegraph report on the Ethereum merge also reported, ‘The upcoming final testnet merge will only impact the node operators and testnet participants, Ether (ETH) holders and stakers won’t have to make any changes from their end. The testnet merge will be the final rehearsal before the Ethereum mainnet officially merges with the Beacon chain on Sept. 19. However, the perpetual Merge date could see a change depending on the outcome of the Goerli test net.
The PoS transition of the Ethereum network is being slated as the biggest upgrade for the blockchain network since its inception. The upgrade is focused on increasing scalability through the introduction of sharding and reducing high transaction costs. However, most of the scalability features are expected to be integrated after the completion of the final phase of the transition, which is expected by the second half of 2023.’
Source: CoinTelegraph
