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Cardano's governance journey: a timeline for decentralized democracy

From community workshops to the world's first blockchain Constitution, Cardano has built blockchain's most ambitious governance system. This timeline traces three years of collaboration that culminated with fully autonomous democratic decision-making in 2025.

4 August 2025 Ivan Irakoze 6 mins read

Cardano's governance journey: a timeline for decentralized democracy

The Cardano community has achieved something truly remarkable in the blockchain industry. Over the past three years, ada holders have helped build the most ambitious decentralized governance program in crypto - complete with its own Constitution, elected representatives, and fully autonomous decision-making systems. This timeline traces the key milestones in this extraordinary…

Democratizing security in the Cardano ecosystem: a complete development lifecycle

How Input | Output Engineering is building a suite of integrated tools to make high-assurance development accessible to every Cardano developer

30 July 2025 Joseph Fajen 6 mins read

Democratizing security in the Cardano ecosystem: a complete development lifecycle

Some smart contracts on Cardano may involve high-value transactions. Many developers still rely on security measures commonly used in traditional software development. While manual code reviews, unit testing, and external audits are effective in identifying bugs and other problems, smart contracts pose new and unique challenges. Erroneous or malicious smart contract code could…

Smart contracts on Bitcoin

Bringing expressive smart contracts and decentralized applications to Bitcoin with a new toolset

19 July 2025 Riley Kilgore 4 mins read

Smart contracts on Bitcoin

What if you could take a smart contract, written using a modern language like Python, TypeScript, or Scala, and run it on Bitcoin without modifying Bitcoin itself?

Thanks to a novel compilation pipeline being developed at Input | Output (IO), that idea is becoming a reality. By combining a serialized smart contract format (Untyped Plutus Core – UPLC), a clever interpreter architecture (Control, Environment, Continuation (CEK) machine), and a widely supported open-source reduced instruction set architecture (RISC-V), IO…

A new era of smart contract verification on Cardano

Security matters. Learn more about a new tool that makes automated formal verification of Cardano contracts easier, faster, and more accessible than ever

17 July 2025 Romain Soulat 7 mins read

A new era of smart contract verification on Cardano

On Cardano, smart contracts are written in powerful surface languages, such as Plinth, Aiken, and Plu–ts, among others. These contracts control real, valuable assets. If they fail, funds could be stolen or permanently locked.

Input | Output (IO) is developing a new tool to bring formal verification to Cardano smart contracts. While existing tools in the ecosystem – based on…

Cardano tokenomics: design, incentives, and stablecoins

The July 2025 Cardano R&D Session brought together researchers, builders, and governance leaders to explore the future of tokenomics on Cardano. From validator incentives to stablecoin design, the discussion unpacked how economic mechanisms can drive sustainable growth, deepen decentralization, and strengthen ecosystem resilience.

9 July 2025 Fergie Miller 9 mins read

In the second installment of the Cardano R&D Sessions – a monthly series exploring the forefront of blockchain research and development – Input | Output Research (IOR), in collaboration with the Intersect Research Working Group, hosted a dynamic discussion on one of the ecosystem’s most pressing and complex topics: tokenomics.

Bringing together leading researchers and…