Synapse (SYN) is an interoperability protocol that facilitates the secure and effective transfer of arbitrary data between blockchains. Users of Synapse can move and swap their assets across various networks, including layer 1, layer 2, and sidechain ecosystems. The project is designed to enhance inter-blockchain compatibility, enabling users to transfer their assets more efficiently between different networks. To securely transfer user assets while maintaining slippage, liquidity pool balances, and transaction prices, Synapse employs a stableswap algorithm. The Synapse ecosystem consists of six components: the Synapse Bridge technology, the cross-chain AMM, aggregated cross-chain communication, the SYN token, the Synapse Chain, and optimistic security approaches. Synapse’s generalized messaging system allows any arbitrary data to be transmitted securely and seamlessly across chains. Applications no longer need to be individually deployed on multiple blockchains; instead, they can be deployed on a single chain and communicate with others to offer the same user experience from a centralized application layer. This generic message passing also includes smart contract calls, enabling smart contracts on different chains to interact easily. The Synapse Bridge facilitates the seamless and secure swapping of on-chain assets across over 15 EVM and non-EVM blockchains. The bridge supports two types of bridging: Canonical Token Bridging, which involves the bridging of wrapped assets across chains, and Liquidity-based Bridging, which involves the bridging of native assets across cross-chain stableswap pools. Synapse Chain is an Ethereum-based optimistic rollup that acts as a sovereign execution environment for cross-chain use cases. It provides developers with a generalized smart contract interface for creating natively cross-chain use cases by utilizing Synapse’s cross-chain messaging system. Applications built on Synapse Chain can execute their business logic across any blockchain. Synapse supports multiple EVM-compatible blockchains and is integrated with nearly 18 layer-1 and layer-2 chains, including Ethereum, Optimism, Arbitrum, Harmony, Avalanche, Polygon, Moonbeam, Fantom, and BNB Chain. For further information and detailed metrics, visit Eulerpool.

Synapse, headquartered in Singapore, does not publicly disclose information about its founders, co-founders, or team members. Nevertheless, the core team maintains active presence on Twitter, utilizing account names such as AureliusBTC, Socrates0x, Caesar0x, and Trajan. In March 2022, Max Bronstein was appointed as the Chief Operating Officer of the protocol. Bronstein's previous experience includes involvement with the cryptocurrency startup Dharma, where he contributed to creating the initial DeFi lending markets. He was also among the early investors in Coinbase, where he played a role in the platform's development. Synapse emerged as a rebranded version of Nerve Finance, which was the pioneering stableswap Automated Market Maker (AMM) on the BNB Smart Chain (BSC). In August 2021, the project transitioned to Synapse Protocol, updating its business model while retaining key investors such as Three Arrows Capital, CMS Holdings, Alameda Research, Immutable Capital, Primitive Ventures, DeFiance Capital, and Mechanism Capital. The governance of Synapse’s protocol is managed by its community through a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) comprised of SYN token holders—known as Synapse DAO. Community members direct the development of the protocol by engaging in voting and participating in governance activities. For further information, refer to Eulerpool.

Synapse Chain is constructed as an Optimistic Rollup, providing several benefits:

Synapse (SYN) serves as the native token of its platform, driving the entire ecosystem. The token has a capped maximum supply of 250,000,000 coins and a total supply of 192,696,599 coins. As of March 2023, the circulation of SYN is at 139,773,376. The tokenomics of the platform are designed to incentivize SYN users who engage with the ecosystem. Users can exchange the cross-chain tokens nUSD and nETH across different networks. SYN tokens perform multiple functions, including:

As of March 2023, Synapse (SYN) is available on prominent cryptocurrency exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase Exchange, Kraken, KuCoin, SushiSwap, PancakeSwap, Gate.io, Huobi, Uniswap, Bitget, BKEX, LBank, MEXC, Phemex, CoinEx, BitMart, Bitrue, BTCEX, XT.COM, among others. Interested in monitoring the Synapse (SYN) price in real-time? Download the Eulerpool mobile app. Stay informed with the latest cryptocurrency news and educational content through Eulerpool Alexandria. Explore in depth the differences between Web 2.0 and Web 3.0.

How Is the Synapse Network Secured? Synapse's optimistic verification model is inspired by Celo’s Optics protocol. Security models for most blockchain bridges today can generally be categorized in three ways: Locally verified, where only the parties involved in a specific cross-chain interaction verify transactions; Natively verified, where all validators of the two blockchains involved in a transaction verify the message; Externally verified, which employs an external validator set to verify transactions between chains. Despite these three fundamental archetypes for cross-chain verification, most bridges today still practically function as basic multi-signature consensus models to provide a faster user experience. While beneficial for achieving quick finality, this speed comes with drawbacks, potentially exposing users to security risks. As highlighted in the Interoperability Trilemma, there are inherent trade-offs in cross-chain communication. The trade-off between security and speed has led to numerous bridge hacks, resulting in cumulative losses exceeding $500 million USD. Optimistic verification draws from optimistic rollups, where transactions are presumed honest by default, with a network of off-chain actors responsible for submitting fraud proofs within an optimistic window to prevent fraudulent transactions. This mechanism significantly enhances network security, making it far more difficult and costly for an adversary to execute an attack compared to the existing M of N mechanism. Externally verified networks rely on an honest majority assumption, while optimistic verification depends on a single honest verifier assumption. It requires just one honest actor to ensure the system's security. Instead of a malicious actor needing to compromise M validators, they would need to compromise all N actors, making the cost to attack the network unlimited as the number of N fraud watchers increases. Naturally, this added security comes with a trade-off: increased latency. Four off-chain actors are critical to the security of Synapse's optimistic verification mechanism: Notary, responsible for signing the Merkle root on each supported chain and bonding SYN behind attestations; Broadcaster, responsible for forwarding updates from home contracts to replica contracts; Guard, responsible for observing cross-chain messages and submitting fraud proofs when detecting malicious state updates; and Executor, responsible for posting the final transaction once the latency window concludes.