Binance Russia Community AMA
Tags: Ama, Blockchain, Quarkchain, Technology

On the morning of August 20th in California and the evening of the 20th local time in Moscow, QuarkChain held an AMA event in Binance’s official Russia group. QuarkChain founder and CEO, Dr. Zhou Qi, participated in the event. He introduced to the community members how QuarkChain built the next generation of the DeFi network and introduced the way to participate in the “Game of DeFi” campaign.

The following is the content review of the Live AMA.

About QuarkChain

QuarkChain is a next-generation heterogeneous sharding technology. It is a highly flexible, highly scalable, as well as user-friendly blockchain platform.

The key word is heterogenous sharding. What is heterogeneous sharding? We know a single chain is a combination of: 1, consensus; 2, ledger model; 3, tx model; and 4, token economics.

Unlike a lot of sharding projects (ETH2.0/ZIL, etc) that enforce every shard chain must follow the same consensus/ledger/tx model, and token eco, we allow different shards to run different consensus/ledger/tx model and token eco.

This brings us great flexibility and scalability!

In addition, we also proposed the function of multi-native tokens. Users can create their native tokens (not ERC20-like tokens). The user-created native tokens enjoy almost the same rights as QKC — our default native token.

They can transfer directly, call contracts, move between chains, and even pay as a transaction fee directly! Most of the non-native asset safety/scalability/user-friendly problems faced by Defi can be efficiently solved by native tokens!

Finally, we launched Binance in June 2018, one of the few projects that launched on Binance in 2018. At present, our mainnet has been running stably for more than a year.

Question 1

You mentioned sharding in the introduction. I guess everyone is familiar with this word. ETH2.0 has been talking about sharding. Last year, the two IEO projects Elrond and Harmony on our Binance platform also did sharding. Polkadot, which will be launched this year, is doing sharding. Even the old project Zil is too. So what is the difference between QuarkChain’s sharding and theirs? Where is the advantage?

Dr. Zhou

Great question!

Let me give a picture of comparisons.

Here I would like to highlight 2 things: 1, one is heterogenous sharding; 2, second is that we have launched the network for more than 2 years.

Again, for heterogeneous sharding, we have a graph for better illustration:

Imagine a single chain network like EOS, Tezos, Cardano is like a one-way highway (BTC may be a muddy road ….)

Sharding is like a highway with multiple ways — all the ways are the same (each chain must have the same consensus/tx-ledger model/token eco). But it must be cars/trucks running on it, not bicycles.

Heterogeneous sharding is more like our traffic system — people with cars such as lambo can enjoy highways or local ways, while people with bicycles can use local ways (and of course, people can also walk)

This allows us to harvest all kinds of latest blockchain technologies, PoS/PoW/UTXO/ZK-SNARK, etc.

Further, one cool thing we built is that as long as the shard chains follow our cross-shard protocol, they could talk to each other easily — Imagine a privacy shard chain transfers some tokens to another EVM-like chain and vice versa.

One even interesting network we build is to run public/consortium shard chains in the single network — the consortium shard chain can be permissioned (but can be used following regulation easier), while the public shard chain is permissionless.

Heterogeneous sharding opens a lot of opportunities, and we sincerely invite our community to join and explore together with us!

Question 2

What is the future trending of the DeFi, in your opinion? What is the biggest flaw facing DeFi today?

Dr. Zhou

We believe DeFi is a very important application of blockchain and it has a lot of unique values.

We are very optimistic about DeFi and have been working on DeFi for a while.

However, when we are observing DeFi and experimenting our DeFi ideas, we found a couple of challenges:

1, Security issues; 2, Low scalability; 3, Bad user experiences

1. For security issues, we found several issues rooted from the nature that the platform (ETH) uses ERC20 to represent assets, where ERC20 can cause a lot of problems.

First of all, the security problems caused by non-standard ERC20 (for example, 25M USD stolen from lendf.me is because of such vulnerability.)

Second, because of the constraints of ERC20, before using the asset to join DeFi, everyone needs to approve some amounts of user assets (likely infinite) to the DeFi contract so that the DEFI contract can transfer user’s token on THE BEHAVE OF USERS!

Here is the diagram.

This means that if a DeFI contract is hacked, the attacker can steal not only the DeFi contract’s assets, but also the assets under the users’ names.

Earlier this year, Bancor had a similar problem, and through a white hat attack,it attacked itself and recovered nearly 0.5M losses.

2. Scalability — Gas fee is exploding these days, and I believe everybody is suffering from it. However, being able to move ERC20 between shards is still an open question in most sharding projects.

3. User experience. Users have to pay the tx fees using ETH, but not a token issued by the DeFi. This raises the bar of users.

Further, approve issue of ERC20 causes extra transactions — more steps and more tx fee.

Question 4

How does QuarkChain try to solve the problem?

Dr. Zhou

QuarkChain is designed from scratch targeting to solve all these problems! Together with our heterogeneous sharding + multi-native tokens, we could achieve:

- Very low gas with high TPS: 1/10 or 1/100 lower gas compared to ETH

- Much safer: No ERCO20 approval means that the user’s assets will never be able to be transferred by a malicious contract!

- Pay any native token as gas: Users can use native token to pay gas fee (Imagine using a USD-backed asset to pay fee :) )

I firmly believe with all the features, we could bring a lot of values to DeFi applications and enable further DeFi prosperity!

Question 4

It sounds excellent that QuarkChain wants to use its unique heterogeneous sharding and multi-native toke technologies to solve the current DeFi problems. Could you let us know that as the users, what products can we experience the next-generation DeFi network developed by QuarkChain?

Dr. Zhou

Instead of typing, we would love to demonstrate the features and collect more feedback from you!

To let everyone experience the security and the ease-of-use of the next generation of DeFi, with multi-native tokens + sharding, we started an event called Game of Defi.

We also offer a 5M QKC bonus pool to invite everyone to have a taste of future DeFi!

We have three phases:

1, Bounty program; 2, Multi-native token game; 3; Liquidity mining game!

Phase I: Prologue — QuarkChain 3rd Bounty Program, which already started on Aug 14th. You can join the QuarkChain 3rd Bounty Program in this phase and share the 5 million $QKC reward pool!

The details of Game of DeFi can be found here

Bounty Program here:

If you want to a look, please join our community Telegram group to learn more about the latest information about the DeFi products and the Bounty Program: https://t.me/quarkchainio

You can also find us through the following link:

Question 5

Besides these exciting DeFi products, tell us the most significant focuses for QuarkChain in the coming half year?

Dr. Zhou

Thanks for the question!

We plan to launch an open source DApp with the functions of staking and mining in Q3, which will allow more users to join the staking feature of us.

If you are interested in staking, you could first take a look at our Staking 1.0 doc:

The 2nd is the mainnet of BigBang with the multi-native token function will be officially launched in Q3

In addition to the multi-chain heterogeneous blockchain structure from the heterogeneous sharding technology, the mainnet BigBang will also have the unique function of the multi-native token, which means that except for QKC, the tokens published on the QuarkChain mainnet can have the same functions as QKC, including invoking contracts, paying transaction fees, and realizing the release of multi-native tokens with one click.

For information for the 2nd half of 2020 is here:

The 3rd is the enterprise solutions.

We have finished several enterprise corporations in the H1 of 2020: the Environmental Governance Platform on Blockchain and the in-depth technical cooperation with Amazon Web Service (AWS).

The Environmental Governance Platform on Blockchain launched by QuarkChain provides a well-planned system that uses heterogeneous sharding to avoid the need to relaunch a new chain for each expansion as it allows customized configuration of four basic components of blockchain, which are consensus, transaction model, ledger model, and token economics, and thus different shards can be added when facing different needs.

You can learn more about the Environmental Governance Platform on Blockchain here:

QuarkChain reached in-depth technical cooperation with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and launched an Enterprise of the high-performance and highly flexible “Blockchain as a Service” (BaaS) one-stop application platform on AWS. The clients can build applications with higher availability and more customized applications on the platform.

In the next half year, we have planned more Enterprise opportunities and will be happy to share once we have more!

Live AMA

Question 1 from @momfly

How are QKC tokens used? What are the benefits of holding them?

Dr. Zhou

QKC is the default native token in QuarkChain. It can be used to pay the tx fee. It is a store of value and can be transferred. And it could be used to secure the network by staking QKC and mining on top of it (so that the mining is more efficient).

Currently, with QKC staked, the return reward is about 2x-100x compared to ETH (depending on how much you stake :) http://calc.quarkchain.io/

Question 2 from @qAndrewp

How do you see your project in 5 years and just wondering if you have any plans to integrate QuarkChain into the traditional business?

Dr. Zhou

In 5 years, I believe blockchain will enter a new era and more people are here. And I believe QuarkChain can play an important role in blockchain such as DeFi. For traditional, e.g., Enterprise, we have accomplished two corporations with AWS and governmental protection. Definitely, there will be more!

Question 3 from @Invest_hold

Tell us more about QuarkChain’s “Game of DeFi” please. What are the conditions and opportunities for earning money for members of the Binance community?

Dr. Zhou

You just need testnet QKC, which is free by using faucet. Further, you could lock your QKC (for a few days) to earn testnet QKC faster and easier to get the rewards!

Please join our community the check the latest info: https://t.me/quarkchainio

Question 4 from @starkyiv

1.1 How does QuarkChain overcome the threat of centralization?

1.2 Do you have any plans for using another blockchain, such as Binance Smart Chain?

Dr. Zhou

We are running Proof-of-Stake Work consensus, which allows both miners and stakers come together to secure the network and deal with the threads. For another chain, we currently do have a plan but highly depends on application needs.

The future goal is highly dynamic, but one important thing is to make sure the network is running smoothly and attract more applications. We are also closely watching how the network runs and proposes new features.

Question 5 from @Millen08

What is the main value of QuarkChain project for long term investors?

Dr. Zhou

What is the main value of the QuarkChain project for long term investors?

The core value of the QKC is the use of the network — the more people use, more QKC is needed. This is also why we are working hard on optimizing QuarkChain as the future DeFi platform — where we believe QKC can provide core values in this area!

Question 6 from @sy40k

Has the scalability problem been solved at the moment?

Dr. Zhou

Unfortunately not. Our recent study shows that even single-chain performance has a lot of room (10x-100x) to improve (unfortunately everybody is focusing on sharding). We believe that combining both single-chain performance improvement and sharding is the final solution of the scalability problem.

Question 7 from@photoboll

Can I run the QuarkChain node? What does it take?

Dr. Zhou

Your desktop with 200G disk would be good or a $40 per month DigitalOcean node. We have both the python version and go version, and I would recommend you try go one :)

Link is here https://github.com/QuarkChain/goquarkchain