ETH Relay: A Cost-efficient Relay for Ethereum-based Blockchains

Abstract

Current blockchain relay schemes require the immediate validation of each relayed block header by the destination blockchain. This leads to high operating cost when deploying these relays between Ethereum-based blockchains where validating block headers on-chain is computationally expensive.To overcome these limitations, we introduce a novel relay scheme that employs a validation-on-demand pattern combined with economic incentives to reduce the cost of operating a relay between Ethereum-based blockchains by up to 92%. With this relay scheme, decentralized interoperability between blockchains like Ethereum and Ethereum Classic becomes feasible.