Ethereum to Release Pectra Upgrade on Testnets on February 24th

Ethereum is scheduled to deploy the Pectra upgrade to its testnets. On February 24th at epoch 115,968, the upgrade will be implemented on Holesky. Subsequently, on March 5th at epoch 222,464, it will be activated on Sepolia.

ETH Info

Ethereum is a decentralized, open-source blockchain platform that was proposed in 2013 by Vitalik Buterin and launched in 2015. It serves as a foundation for building and running smart contracts and decentralized applications (DApps). While Bitcoin focuses primarily on peer-to-peer electronic cash transactions, Ethereum expands the functionality of blockchain technology by enabling the execution of complex programmable contracts.

At the core of Ethereum is its native cryptocurrency called Ether ETHUSD, which is used to facilitate transactions and incentivize participants in the network. However, Ethereum's main innovation lies in its ability to support the creation of smart contracts. Smart contracts are self-executing agreements with predefined rules and conditions written in code. They automatically execute transactions or perform actions once the conditions outlined in the contract are met.

Developers can build decentralized applications on top of Ethereum using its Solidity programming language. These applications can cover a wide range of use cases, including financial services, decentralized exchanges, decentralized finance (DeFi), non-fungible tokens (NFTs), and more.

Ethereum introduced the concept of ERC-20 tokens, which are fungible tokens that can be created on the Ethereum platform and used for various purposes, including fundraising through Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) and tokenizing assets.

Ethereum has a thriving ecosystem and community of developers and users, and it has become one of the most popular and widely adopted blockchain platforms. However, it has faced challenges such as scalability and high transaction fees, which the Ethereum community is actively working on through upgrades like Ethereum 2.0 to address these issues and improve the network's performance and scalability.