1/ This week in the pack. From infra to apps, here’s your weekly Starknet recap 👇

1/ Bitcoin staking is fully live on Starknet Mainnet 🧡 BTC is now part of Starknet’s staking mechanism, letting Bitcoiners secure the network and earn rewards alongside STRK stakers. A historic moment for Bitcoin and Starknet 🧵

ALERT Do not click the Discord link on our website. It's been changed to a scam Discord server. We're investigating how that's been possible and will change it ASAP. Until further notice, do not use the Discord link on starkdefi.com. Thank you

Staking has arrived on @Starknet, and there’s a ton of exciting updates! 🥩🔥 Dive into the latest news on the Starknet ecosystem with “Le Monde De Starknet” by @Gurk_TV 🔥 📰 Check it out below ⤵️

New wallet integration! 📲 🎉 @StarkDeFi is now accessible with one click from the Braavos dApp Gallery, unlocking a seamless DeFi experience for all Braavos users on Starknet! Let’s unpack all the benefits of using StarkDeFi 🧵

📢INTRODUCING OUR NEXT LAUNCHPAD PROJECT 🎮 @Atemu_world: The @Starknet Saga Begins 🗓️ This October, witness the birth of a legendary card game. The gods, warriors, and demons of Atemu are about to descend upon @Starknet!! 🔗 @Flex_strk will be the epicenter of this cosmic clash. @Atemu_world, the first-ever strategy card game on @Starknet, is launching an extremely limited collection this Halloween season! This isn't just a game. It's an experience. @Atemu_world is pushing the boundaries of gaming on @Starknet with unparalleled graphics, immersive gameplay, and physical cards for the community‼️

We are excited to announce SHARP v6.0 upgrade! 💅 This major upgrade introduces several powerful features: 1⃣ Applicative Recursion: This feature allows decoupling L2 block frequency from L1 costs. Public Starknet will use this in the v0.13.2 upgrade to significantly reduce block times without additional L1 costs. This will result in a 7X reduction in confirmation times from ~15 seconds to approximately 2 seconds 🤯. To better understand what applicative recursion is and how it works, read @VolokhIlia's excellent post👇: community.starknet.io/t/upco… 2⃣ Rust Implementation: As part of our efforts to Rustify 🦀 our stack, we have reimplemented the validation and processing of incoming jobs in Rust. This results in up to 9X improvement in run time, reducing validation times for a block with 2^26 cairo steps from ~45 minutes to under 5 minutes. Consequently, this will substantially shorten proving times, potentially reducing L1 settlement times. Many thanks to Moonsong-Labs for allowing the execution of the cairo-bootloader in Rust! github.com/Moonsong-Labs/cai… 3⃣ New arithmetic circuit builtin: This upgrade introduces new builtins that allow performing arithmetic operations with respect to any 384 bit modulus. With these arithmetic circuits we can perform cryptographic operations that were previously cost-prohibitive and are now possible thanks to up to 10X efficiency improvement. This unlock enables applications to use cryptographic schemes such as scalar multiplication on various curves and BLS pairing verification. Check out the Garaga project that leverages this new builtin to enable efficient pairing and Groth16 verification. github.com/keep-starknet-str… This summer is all about optimizing the Starknet stack! 🫡

1/ @StarkDefi StarkDeFi leverages zk-rollups and the StarkEx engine to boost Ethereum transaction speed and reduce costs. Backed by @gate_io and a Starknet grant, it offers: ✜ AMM ✜ Farms ✜ Staking ✜ Launchpad