XEQM Labs
Phase 1 complete, 20/20 PASS
XEQM LabsWe forced operator concentration to stall Pulse consensus twenty times in a row. Every time, the network kept producing blocks on its proof-of-work safety net and healed itself back to Pulse, with zero operator intervention.
Pulse finalizes blocks with a quorum of independent operators. If too few control the network (operator concentration), a small colluding set could rubber-stamp blocks, censoring transactions or rewriting recent history. HF22 refuses that outcome: below the operator threshold, Pulse simply stops finalizing rather than run under-decentralized. The chain stays live on a proof-of-work fallback until enough independent operators return, then Pulse resumes on its own. This test proves that refuse-and-recover behavior holds, cycle after cycle.
20 operators run 40 service nodes. Pulse finalizes every block with a signed validator quorum.
Operators 11-20 exit, ten operators gone. Only 10 unique operators remain, below the quorum threshold.
With too few independent operators, Pulse stops finalizing. The chain does not stop. PoW fallback (GOV_SIGNED) keeps producing blocks so transactions keep flowing.
Re-register op11 + op12 → 12 unique operators. That is the count that guarantees a quorum can form in both Pulse rounds.
Within 2-5 blocks the validator quorum re-forms and Pulse finalizes again. No operator action, no restart, no manual step.
Twenty consecutive stall/recovery cycles at 60-second block time. Slowest recovery was 5 blocks (cycle 10); eight cycles recovered in the minimum 2 blocks. Every recovery re-formed with 8-11 validator signatures, always clear of the 7-signature safety floor.
Recovery re-registers two operators (op11 + op12), not one: 12 unique operators guarantees a quorum can form in both Pulse rounds. At 11, round 0 can drop to 10 if the block leader's operator holds a single node, which is why the recovery target is 12, not 11.
| Cycle | Stall height | Recovery height | Blocks | Pulse result |
|---|
PASS = Pulse consensus resumed (validator bitset ≠ 0, ≥ 7 validator signatures) within one re-registration event, with zero manual intervention.
HF22 is only as strong as the operators who stand behind it. Read how it works, and join the people building EXIOM.