Dusk’s peer-to-peer (P2P) layer, Kadcast, provides a structured and efficient com-
munication protocol for the propagation of blocks, transactions, and consensus mes-
sages. Unlike unstructured P2P protocols such as Gossip [19] and LibP2P [20], which
broadcast messages indiscriminately to all neighboring nodes, Kadcast utilizes the
Kademlia distributed hash table (DHT) protocol to organize nodes in a hierarchi-
cal structure and optimize data transmission paths using XOR distance metrics [21].
This structured approach enables Kadcast to reduce message redundancy and achieve
more efficient bandwidth usage compared to unstructured protocols.
Studies indicate that Kadcast achieves an approximate 25-50% reduction in band-
width usage compared to Gossip protocols, as nodes forward messages only to se-
lected peers rather than broadcasting to all neighboring nodes [22]. This bandwidth
optimization not only conserves network resources but also leads to tangible energy
savings at both the node and infrastructure levels. By minimizing the number of transmissions required to propagate data across the network, Kadcast conserves en-
ergy on individual nodes by lowering the computational load associated with message
processing. Moreover, reduced bandwidth usage alleviates data load on the internet
backbone, indirectly reducing energy expenditure on global data routing.
In addition to bandwidth efficiency, Kadcast’s structured message propagation
contributes to a 10-30% reduction in stale block rates in scenarios with faster block
times, such as Ethereum-like networks [22]. Lower stale block rates mean that nodes
spend less computational power on processing blocks that ultimately do not get ac-
cepted into the chain, reducing the energy overhead associated with redundant block
validation and consensus efforts. In PoS networks, this reduction translates into more
efficient utilization of network resources, as fewer block attestations are wasted$DUSK
