Introduction to Quai
A high level overview of Quai Network’s fundamental building blocks.
Quai Network
Quai Network is crypto for the global and compute economies.
Quai is the only fully scalable and programmable Proof-of-Work Layer-1. Through the implementation of a variety of new Proof-of-Work primitives, including a category-creating native “stablecoin” connected to the cost of energy, Quai brings reliable, real-world value on-chain to function as financial infrastructure for a compute-centric economy.
Energy-Based “Stablecoin”
Functions as decentralized money for the compute economy.
The ability to accommodate the ever growing userbase of humans and AI agents.
![](https://mintlify.s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/dominantstrategies/images/HierarchicalStructure.jpg)
Energy-Based “Stablecoin”
Within Quai, Proof-of-Work is used not only to secure the network from attackers, but also to function as an oracle for real-world demand and energy costs, allowing for the creation of a completely decentralized “stablecoin” tied to energy. This token is not pegged to or backed by any asset, but rather exclusively uses market incentives to consistently drive the token’s price towards the cost of energy.
Energy is the single largest input to both human activity and artificial intelligence. The intrinsic value of energy to both man and machine makes it an ideal foundation for a new currency to be built upon.
Quai Network joins protocols like Hacash and Themelio as a leader in the emerging category of decentralized Proof-of-Work “stablecoins.”
Unleashed Scalability
Through the use of a new Proof-of-Work fork-choice rule named Proof-of-Entropy-Minima (PoEM), Quai Network is able to remain in consensus while coordinating enough execution shards to support all of global commerce. This property allows Quai Network to dynamically add shards to the network as needed in order to meet perpetually growing demand. The only tradeoff to adding shards to Quai (and thus increasing throughput) is an increased time to cross-shard settlement.
Trustless bridging between all shards in the network is achieved by using miners to create objective links between shards.
Quai Network’s native, pre-defined scaling creates a mechanism for congestion to be alleviated as demand increases, keeping fees permanently low even with growing usage.
Testnets
Currently, Quai Network is in the testnet and development phase. The roadmap for Quai Network includes two remaining testnets prior to Mainnet launch:
Golden Age Testnet
The debut of final features like the Two Token System, LibP2P, Snap-Syncing, and more.
Silicon Age Testnet
Intended to squash final bugs and prepare the client for Mainnet readiness.
For each of these Testnets, our team at Dominant Strategies expects to run both a Testnet and Devnet, in addition to providing tools such as block explorers, network statistics pages, and faucets.
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