Briefing
The core research problem is the Proposer-Builder Collusion Dilemma in Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS) architectures, where a proposer can exploit private block content information or collude with a builder to maximize their joint profit, undermining the chain’s credible neutrality. The paper introduces the Sealed-Bid Commit-Reveal Auction (SBCRA), a novel mechanism design that cryptographically enforces a separation between the bid value and the block payload content. This mechanism requires builders to commit to both their payload and bid simultaneously, forcing the proposer to select the winner based purely on the committed bid value before the block contents are revealed. This foundational breakthrough establishes a new standard for transaction ordering fairness, ensuring that the economic security of the system is preserved against sophisticated collusion vectors.
Context
Before this research, the prevailing solution to mitigate Maximal Extractable Value (MEV) centralization risk was Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS), which delegates block construction to specialized builders and selection to a proposer. However, established PBS models only separate the roles , failing to fully separate the information flow and incentives. The theoretical limitation remained the Proposer-Builder Collusion Dilemma, where a rational proposer, having access to the builder’s payload or being able to signal intent, could still collude to extract value or censor transactions, thereby centralizing the critical block-ordering function.
Analysis
The paper’s core mechanism, the Sealed-Bid Commit-Reveal Auction (SBCRA), is a two-phase cryptographic primitive that fundamentally alters the block construction game. In the Commit phase, a builder submits a cryptographic commitment to their block payload and a sealed-bid for that payload. This commitment is a succinct, verifiable proof that the builder has finalized their block structure without revealing the content.
In the Reveal phase, the proposer selects the highest committed bid, and only after this selection is the winning builder required to reveal the full block payload. This sequence ensures the proposer’s decision is based exclusively on the economic signal (the bid) and is provably independent of the private transaction data, thus cryptographically enforcing credible neutrality in the block selection process.
Parameters
- Collusion Resistance Factor ∞ 1.0. This is the theoretical collusion resistance factor achieved by the SBCRA, indicating the complete decoupling of the proposer’s selection criteria from the builder’s private payload contents.
Outlook
This theoretical framework on collusion-resistant auction design opens new avenues for mechanism design research in decentralized systems. In the next 3-5 years, the SBCRA primitive is expected to become the foundational component for highly decentralized shared sequencers across the rollup ecosystem, enabling atomic cross-chain transactions with guaranteed fair ordering. Furthermore, the model can be generalized to secure other multi-party computation environments, such as decentralized oracle networks or private data marketplaces, where a verifiable separation of decision criteria and private data is paramount.
Verdict
The SBCRA mechanism is a critical, foundational breakthrough that formally resolves the Proposer-Builder Collusion Dilemma, fundamentally strengthening the credible neutrality of all future modular blockchain architectures.
