@USDD - Decentralized USD #USDD以稳见信 As more data accumulates, running a full node becomes more expensive and fragile. An EF blog post noted that “if the state becomes too large, too centralized, or too difficult to serve, all of these layers become more fragile, more expensive, and harder to decentralize."

Scaling improvements such as Layer 2 expansion, EIP-4844 (proto-danksharding), and gas limit increases have enabled more activity, but they also accelerate the growth of the state.

The researchers cautioned that if only a small set of sophisticated operators can afford to store and serve the full state, Ethereum’s censorship resistance, neutrality, and resilience could weaken. The team said it is actively stress-testing to determine when “state growth becomes a scaling bottleneck,” when “state size makes it hard for nodes to follow the head of the chain,” and when “client implementations start failing under extreme state size.”