Detailed explanation of the working principle and development status of the Cosmos cross-chain bridge Gravity Bridge

Gravity is the fundamental force of the universe that aligns all the planets in the orbits of the composable universe. Like Gravity, Gravity Bridge aims to pool the liquidity of the Ethereum ecosystem into the Cosmos ecosystem with a simple trustless and interoperable design.

Interoperability and authenticity are the spirit of Cosmos and the Internet of Blockchains, and it is these very core value propositions that will propel the ecosystem into the Cosmos DeFi era through the Gravity Bridge!



Gravity Bridge milestones to date



Gravity Bridge recently announced several exciting milestones:

Within weeks of enabling Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC), the Cosmos interoperability standard, Gravity Bridge entered the top 15 Cosmos chains on mapofzones.com, with 32 channels open to different Cosmos blockchains
Cosmos NFT platform Stargaze is working with Gravity Bridge to send NFTs from Ethereum to Cosmos
Initial airdrop for ATOM stakers and OSMO community pool to help start distributing GRAV (the native token of Gravity Bridge) to the community
Gravity Grants propose to distribute GRAV tokens through governance to teams building bridge tools and other infrastructure that benefit the Cosmos ecosystem
Cosmos Hub and several other Cosmos chains (Stargaze, Nym, Comdex, CertiK and Chihuahua) connect to the Ethereum ecosystem
You can now use ATOM with Ethereum DeFi


What is Gravity Bridge?



The Gravity Bridge blockchain is a trustless neutral bridge between the Ethereum and Cosmos ecosystems. Built using the Cosmos SDK, it uses a set of validators to sign transactions, rather than a multi-signature or permissioned set of participants.

Neutrality here means that the entire focus of the Gravity community is to provide bridges that are as efficient and secure as possible, not native on-chain DeFi applications. This neutrality aggregates transaction volumes from multiple blockchains and sources, increasing efficiency and reducing costs. All control of the bridge is handled entirely by the Gravity Bridge validator set.

Best features:

The Gravity Bridge protocol is an extremely simple cross-chain bridge design focused on providing better security by removing design complexity.

Highly decentralized: all funds are directly controlled by validators (currently 140)
Safe and censorship resistant: Advanced slashing ensures that validators cannot sign or submit bridged messages without consensus
Built for Cosmos: Built for the Cosmos ecosystem as a neutral platform with a permissionless front end
Gas efficiency: Rollup batch transactions can reduce gas costs for individual users by up to 96%
Fast and Reliable: A strong relay reward system combined with reduced gas costs creates extremely fast and reliable transfers through a decentralized, self-funded relay community