LibraryConsensus2018Design paperCorpus record
Scaling Nakamoto Consensus to Thousands of Transactions per Second
Conflux. Chenxing Li, Peilun Li, Dong Zhou, Wei Xu, Fan Long and Andrew Chi-Chih Yao.
Keep every block in a directed acyclic graph. A pivot chain picks a total order. Honest blocks that lost the race still contribute security and transactions.
A reading of the public document. Not a copy of it, and not a claim about a later network that reused the name.
A chain that raises the block rate and orphans honest work has not used this idea. Ask whether losing blocks still count.
The five-minute read
The defect
Bitcoin throws away forks. At a high block rate, honest blocks are thrown away too, and the safety proof thins out.
The rule
Keep every block in a directed acyclic graph. A pivot chain picks a total order. Honest blocks that lost the race still contribute security and transactions.
How it is put together
Blocks point at more than one parent. The pivot chain is a slow, heaviest path. Epochs around the pivot chain yield one transaction order.
Where the claim stops
The paper's throughput is a model, not a promise for a later network.
One action, walked through
- A miner extends the pivot tip and references other recent blocks.
- The heaviest-path rule chooses the pivot.
- Transactions are ordered by epoch, then by a deterministic tie break.
- Do orphaned honest blocks still add weight?
The argument, unpacked
Why it is still on the desk
A chain that raises the block rate and orphans honest work has not used this idea. Ask whether losing blocks still count.
After the text
Conflux the network is a later deployment. Cite the paper for the graph and the pivot chain, and the client for the parameters.
What has to be true
- The paper's throughput is a model, not a promise for a later network.
- A total order still exists. This is not a system with no conflicts.
- Safety still depends on honest majority hash power.
What happened after the paper
Conflux the network is a later deployment. Cite the paper for the graph and the pivot chain, and the client for the parameters.
What to check before you use the idea
- Do orphaned honest blocks still add weight?
- How is the total order derived from the graph?
- What happens to a transaction that appears in two epochs?
Terms
- Pivot chain
- The chain inside the graph that decides order.
- Epoch
- The set of blocks the pivot orders together.
The problem the paper names
Bitcoin throws away forks. At a high block rate, honest blocks are thrown away too, and the safety proof thins out.
What the design proposes
- Blocks point at more than one parent.
- The pivot chain is a slow, heaviest path.
- Epochs around the pivot chain yield one transaction order.
How the mechanism is specified
- A miner extends the pivot tip and references other recent blocks.
- The heaviest-path rule chooses the pivot.
- Transactions are ordered by epoch, then by a deterministic tie break.
What this page does not treat as proven
- The paper's throughput is a model, not a promise for a later network.
- A total order still exists. This is not a system with no conflicts.
- Safety still depends on honest majority hash power.
Why a venture studio still reads it
A chain that raises the block rate and orphans honest work has not used this idea. Ask whether losing blocks still count.
This is Blockchain Lab's reading of a public design paper. It is not the paper, not a copy of it, and not an offer of tokens, equity, custody or a partnership. Later network behaviour can diverge from the text. Nothing here is investment, legal or technical advice.
Research status: Design paper. Last reviewed: 1 October 2026. This is a reading of a public paper, not investment, legal or security advice.