Sharding consensus

A number of blockchain platforms currently available support a capability called sharding consensus. Sharding is a type of data partitioning that separates large databases into smaller, faster, and more manageable parts called shards. Some blockchains try to use sharding consensus to make the blockchain faster and more efficient by not having every validating peer validate the same data blocks. With sharding consensus, a validating peer is assigned to one of the partitions and is only responsible for validating transactions that are part of that partition. Other blockchains implement this capability by allowing participants to create private channels or subnets between specific peers in the network for the purpose of conducting private and confidential transactions, meaning peers can exchange transactions on a global ledger and exchange private transactions with other peers on a private channel. Participants who want to form a channel must be explicitly authenticated and authorized on that channel to transact and share updates on the ledger. Each channel has its own shared digital ledger and transactions log, and it must coexist in the same blockchain.