The Cardano Foundation released the "Cardano Economic Parameters" whitepaper by Professor Massimo Morini, analyzing how parameters like k (desired pool count) and a₀ (pledge influence) shape stake pool rewards. It explores the impact of pool size, pledge, and ecosystem reserves while clarifying reserve distribution between rewards and the treasury. The paper provides insights for stake pool operators and governance participants to support informed decision-making on Cardano’s long-term sustainability.

The Cardano Foundation's recent research paper, "Serial Monopoly on Blockchain with Quasi-Patient Users," co-authored with IOG Research, examines transaction fee mechanisms and their influence on validator incentives. Accepted for presentation at the 29th International Financial Cryptography and Data Security 2025 conference, the study introduces a model bridging impatient and patient users, termed "quasi-patient" users. This approach analyzes how users' varying tolerance for transaction delays impacts fee strategies and blockchain security, offering insights into optimizing transaction fee mechanisms to balance cost efficiency and timely inclusion.

Cardano is transitioning into a community-governed blockchain, emphasizing scalability, usability, and interoperability. The roadmap focuses on advanced scaling solutions like Hydra state channels, layer 2 rollups, and the Ouroboros Leios and Peras protocols to support billions of users by 2030. Enhancements in usability aim to improve the developer experience and broaden decentralized application capabilities. Interoperability efforts include integrating partner chains and sidechains to foster a diverse ecosystem. Community involvement is crucial in shaping this future.

Cardano's EUTXO model provides six key benefits over account-based systems: predictable transactions, ensuring no fees for failed transactions; predictable costs, allowing accurate calculation of fees and resources; enhanced concurrency for simultaneous transaction processing; improved security through determinism and reduced attack vectors; flexibility for innovative decentralized applications; and compatibility with zero-knowledge proofs, enabling complex off-chain computations with verifiable on-chain results. These advantages make EUTXO a scalable, secure, and versatile framework for blockchain applications. For more, read the full article.

The Cardano Foundation emphasizes innovation and research in blockchain technology. Their research paper, “MACS: A Multi-Asset Coin Selection Algorithm for UTxO-based Blockchains,” presented at the 2023 IEEE International Conference on Blockchain, highlights the benefits of the MACS algorithm. MACS optimizes transaction fees, UTxO pool size, and user privacy, improving UTxO-based blockchains. Though tested in simulations, it shows promise for enhancing cost, speed, and privacy in blockchain transactions, with further real-world testing needed.