The 'Useless' Theory Behind Modern SNARKs (ft. Gödel Prize Winner Noam Nisan)
About this episode
Noam Nisan discusses the unexpected practical applications of his theoretical work on the sum-check protocol and its significance in modern SNARKs.
More than 30 years ago, Gödel Prize Winner Noam Nisan helped develop a proof technique that he never expected anyone to use in the real world. At the center of that breakthrough was the sum-check protocol — an elegant technique that emerged from Noam Nisan’s early work on interactive proofs. At the time, even Nisan assumed ideas like these were far too theoretical to become practical technology. Today, sum-check sits at the heart of some of the fastest modern SNARKs, proof systems that are increasingly important to blockchains and verifiable computation.
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