New Week In Ethereum 2025-07-11

• 11 July 2025

The All Core Devs - Consensus (ACDC) #160 call on July 10 focused on Fusaka upgrade progress, with discussions on the launch of fusaka-devnet-3 and preparations for the Glamsterdam upgrade. Key decisions included finalizing BPO (Blob Parameter Override) strategies and selecting a CL headliner for Glamsterdam.

Eth R&D Protocol Call(s)

• All Core Devs - Consensus (ACDC) #160, July 10 2025:
  • Fusaka upgrade:
    • fusaka-devnet-2 status was reviewed, with most clients showing stable performance
    • fusaka-devnet-3 specifications were finalized, targeting a July 7 launch date
    • The devnet will test all validator custody features, including data column sidecars by root and distributed blob building
    • Developers agreed to move forward with engine_getBlobsV2 changes, rolling back to V2 behavior that prohibits partial responses
  • Glamsterdam upgrade:
    • Mark from Lighthouse proposed EIP-7732 (Enshrined Proposer Builder Separation) as the CL headliner
    • Discussion focused on selecting one CL headliner, with EIP-7732 gaining support for its slot restructuring approach
    • Developers discussed the tradeoffs between EIP-7732 and competing proposals like EIP-7782 (reducing block latency)
  • Client updates:
    • CL clients are being updated with new gas limit values
    • Several clients have implemented validator custody features, with Teku supporting backfill while Lighthouse, Prysm, and Grandine support without backfill

Fusaka (Osaka + Fulu) upgrade

• Fusaka-devnet-3 specifications were finalized, with the devnet launching on July 7, 2025. This devnet will test all validator custody features and represents the final testing environment before spec freeze.
• The EIP list for fusaka-devnet-3 includes several important updates:
  • EIP-7594: PeerDAS - Peer Data Availability Sampling with validator custody testing
  • EIP-7825: Transaction Gas Limit Cap to prevent excessive gas usage in single transactions
  • EIP-7939: Count leading zeros (CLZ) opcode with updated gas cost from 3 to 5
  • EIP-7907: Meter Contract Code Size And Increase Limit with formula fixes and adjustments for large contracts
• Developers agreed on a BPO (Blob Parameter Override) strategy for the mainnet rollout, starting with conservative blob limits and gradually increasing based on real-world performance data.

Glamsterdam (Amsterdam–G-Star) Upgrade

• Mark Mackey from Lighthouse published a detailed proposal advocating for EIP-7732: Enshrined Proposer Builder Separation as the Glamsterdam headliner.
• The proposal compares EIP-7732 against competing proposals:
  • EIP-7732 (Enshrined Proposer Builder Separation) offers slot restructuring with payload-block separation
  • EIP-7886 (Delayed Execution) provides an alternative slot restructuring approach
  • EIP-7782 (Reduce Block Latency) would shorten slots from 12 to 6 seconds
  • EIP-7805 (Fork-choice Enforced Inclusion Lists) focuses on censorship resistance
• The analysis argues that EIP-7732 better supports Ethereum's strategic initiatives for scaling L1, scaling L2, and improving UX, while also providing a cleaner separation between consensus and execution layers.
• A decision on the CL headliner is expected at the July 24 ACDC meeting, with developers emphasizing that only one headliner per layer will be selected.

Layer 1

• Partial History Expiry (PHE) has been rolled out across major Ethereum clients including Geth, Besu, and Nethermind, allowing nodes to prune historical state data while maintaining recent history.
• The engine_getBlobsV2 API behavior is being modified to prohibit partial responses, with a new engine_getBlobsV3 proposed to support partial returns in the future.
• A new eth/v2/builder/blinded_blocks API has been proposed that would not return the execution payload and blobs, supporting more efficient block propagation.
• Developers are working on optimizing bandwidth usage for blob propagation, with significant differences observed between clients: Lighthouse and Grandine use ~20 Mbps while Prysm, Teku, and Lodestar average over 80-100 Mbps.

Research

• Privacy-Preserving Sybil Resistance: A new approach combining MPC-TLS and Semaphore proofs was proposed to enable privacy-preserving Sybil resistance mechanisms, allowing users to prove uniqueness without revealing personal information.
• Faster Block/Blob Propagation: Ongoing research into optimizing network propagation for blocks and blobs has seen new contributions, with researchers exploring techniques to reduce bandwidth requirements and improve propagation times.
• Blob Notaries: A distributed blob publishing design was proposed to scale data availability by introducing specialized notaries that help coordinate and validate blob data.
• Multidimensional Gas Metering: Discussions continue on practical approaches to implementing multidimensional gas metering, which would allow for more granular resource pricing in the EVM.

Layer 2

• Base achieves Stage 1 Decentralization with the launch of permissionless fault proofs and an improved contract upgrade process featuring a security council, marking a significant milestone in their journey toward a more decentralized network.

• Starknet introduces Asset Runes, a new Bitcoin-native asset system that gives users 1:1 exposure to Ethereum tokens while remaining on the Bitcoin network, bridging the gap between Bitcoin's security and Ethereum's DeFi ecosystem.

• Optimism client teams prepare for gas limit increase to 45 million, with Prysm, Nimbus, Lodestar, and Lighthouse all implementing updates to support the higher throughput without compromising node stability.

• Fusaka Devnet 3 launch date confirmed for July 21-22, following the identification and resolution of critical interoperability issues in Devnet 2, which will serve as a "happy-path" stress test for the upcoming upgrade.

Stuff for Developers

• Ethereum clients roll out Partial History Expiry (PHE), allowing node operators to prune old historical data and significantly reduce storage requirements. Geth, Besu, and Nethermind have all implemented this feature with various configuration options.

• Engine API v3 blob semantics approved with the merging of PR #674, introducing a new engine_getBlobsV3 endpoint that requires execution layer clients to emit partial blobs, improving reliability for consensus layer implementations.

• Builder API's GetPayload endpoint simplified to no longer return execution payloads or blobs, with relays taking full responsibility for blob delivery. This change, tracked in PR #123, aims to optimize proposer workflows and prevent performance bottlenecks as BPOs expand.

• Standardized eth_config JSON-RPC method adopted following EIP-7910, providing a single authoritative source for genesis parameters such as gas schedules, blob limits, and network forks to prevent client discrepancies.

Ecosystem

• Ethereum Foundation announces Partial History Expiry as a significant step toward a stateless, sustainable, and globally scalable protocol, allowing clients to discard older block data after a certain period while maintaining consensus.

• Glamsterdam upgrade timeline extended to allow for more thorough review of proposed EIPs, with a target decision date of July 24, 2025 for selecting the consensus layer headliner.

• PeerDAS mainnet fork planned for mid-October 2025, with large-scale testnets of at least 1,000 nodes to be deployed in August and September to collect meaningful data on propagation delays and network health.

• Two-phase BPO rollout strategy agreed upon to introduce higher blob throughput without destabilizing the network, with BPO 1 scheduled for approximately one week after Fusaka and BPO 2 following one to two months later.

Centralization watch: threatening the value of your ETH

• 🚨 Lido at 25.84%, still too close to the 33.3% threshold.
• Client diversity (via clientdiversity.org):
  • Execution layer: Geth ~41% & Nethermind ~38%
  • Consensus layer: Lighthouse ~42.71% & Prysm ~30.91%
  • Any client bug over 33.3% could mean loss of finality.
• Better geographic diversity is optimal, particularly outside of North America & Europe.

Client Releases

• Execution layer:
  • Geth v1.16.1: Patch release fixing regressions from v1.16.0, including issues with eth_getLogs, eth_getTransactionReceipt, and geth --vmtrace.
  • Erigon v3.0.14: "Otterly Odyssey" patch fixing bor patch to defer sync events.
  • Reth v1.5.1: Maintenance release with stability improvements, fixes for historical sync on Base mainnet, and support for Flashbots v5 relay block validation API.

EIPs/Standards

• EIPs (Ethereum improvement proposals):
  • EIP-7907: Reduce code limit, increase cost per word, fix EXTCODESIZE issue
  • EIP-7928: Modify CodeChanges List to allow a max of 1
  • EIP-7910: Add Fork Id to response, spec BPOs, add "last"
  • EIP-7939: Change gas cost from 3 to 5
• ERCs (application layer):
  • EIP-7612: Remove redundant word
  • EIPS-7742: Moved to stagnant

Onchain Stats

• Fees (via ultrasound.money):
  • Gas: 0.2 to 9.5 gwei, 1.0 gwei average; zero net issuance at 20.5 gwei
  • 2.7k ETH net issuance this week
• ETHUSD: $2507 – $2598, currently $2,582, all time high $4,878
• ETHBTC: currently 0.0236 (Flippening at ~0.165)

Upcoming Dates of Note

• Jul 17 - ETHGlobal Istanbul hackathon
• Aug 23-25 - ETHWaterloo hackathon
• Sep 12-14 - ETHSafari (Kenya)
• Oct 8-10 - Devcon 7 (Bangkok)
• Nov 15-17 - ETHGlobal San Francisco

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