We’re joined by Alexey Akhunov, an independent Ethereum researcher. Alexey has been working on an ambitious project called TurboGeth. As the name implies, it is a version of Geth which features a number of speed and performance optimizations.
Alexey also leads the state rent working group of the Ethereum 1.x project. Ethereum 1.x came out of Devcon when core developers began to realize that the full migration to Serenity would likely take several years. The team hopes to bring progressive improvements to Ethereum in parallel to the development of Serenity.
Topics covered in this episode:

Alexey’s background as a computer scientist
The story behind TurboGeth and how it differs from the original Geth client
The speed and performance optimizations of TurboGeth, as well as its trade-offs
What is Ethereum 1.x in the context of Ethereum 2.0 (Serenity)
Which people and projects are part of Ethereum 1.x
What is state rent and why it may be beneficial to Ethereum
Implementing state rent in Ethereum 1.x and 2.0
eWASM and how it can be introduced in Ethereum 1.x and 2.0
The future of Ethereum and the progress towards Serenity

Episode links:

Alexey Akhunov on Medium
TurboGeth talk at Bevcon4
Ethereum State rent for Eth 1.x pre-EIP
Ethereum state rent - rough proposal
State Rent proposal version 2 (rushed)
Ethereum state rent proposal 2
ETH Roadmap AMA
EthCC
EthCC Epicenter Meeup

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This episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/274