Before the Ethereum merge of September 2022

Before the Ethereum merge of September 2022, it was often said that Ethereum's execution model was 'single-threaded', meaning that Ethereum can only process one transaction or one smart contract at a time. Has the release of Ethereum 2.0 and the merge with the beacon chain changed its execution model?

No, Ethereum 2.0 has introduced the idea of a multiple-threaded execution model, where the Beacon Chain acts as the hub of activity, allowing for simultaneous transactions which are then synced with the chain. This is in stark contrast to the single-threaded operation previously seen on the older versions of Ethereum, allowing for much faster and more efficient throughput.

Sharding and the Beacon Chain

In Ethereum 2.0, the Beacon Chain acts as the center of activity and the main coordinating source for all the nodes in the Ethereum network. The Beacon Chain is also capable of handling sharding, which is the process of splitting data load and traffic across multiple nodes. As opposed to Ethereum’s previous single-threaded model, this multiple-threaded model allows for much faster transaction times and throughput.

Why is sharding important?

Sharding is important because it prevents the network from being overwhelmed by transactions and increases its ability to scale as more transactions are done through the network.