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## What is the Beacon Chain? {#what-is-the-beacon-chain}
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The Beacon Chain is the name of the original proof-of-stake blockchain that was launched in 2020. It was created to ensure the proof-of-stake consensus logic was sound and sustainable before enabling it on Ethereum Mainnet. Therefore, it ran alongside the original proof-of-work Ethereum. Switching off proof-of-work and switching on proof-of-stake on Ethereum required instructing the Beacon Chain to accept transactions from the original Ethereum chain, bundle them into blocks and then organize them into a blockchain using a proof-of-stake based consensus mechanism. At the same moment, the original Ethereum clients turned off their mining, block propagation and consensus logic, handing that all over to the Beacon Chain. This event was known as [The Merge](/roadmap/merge/). Once The Merge happened, there were no longer two blockchains; there was just one proof-of-stake Ethereum chain. The Merge also introduced a modular blockchain design, which is why Ethereum now consists of two layers that communicate through the Engine API. Those layers are the consensus layer (i.e. the imported Beacon Chain) and the execution layer (i.e. the original Ethereum blockchain).
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The Beacon Chain is the name of the original proof-of-stake blockchain that was launched in 2020. It was created to ensure the proof-of-stake consensus logic was sound and sustainable before enabling it on Ethereum Mainnet. Therefore, it ran alongside the original proof-of-work Ethereum. Switching off proof-of-work and switching on proof-of-stake on Ethereum required instructing the Beacon Chain to accept transactions from the original Ethereum chain, bundle them into blocks and then organize them into a blockchain using a proof-of-stake based consensus mechanism. At the same moment, the original Ethereum clients turned off their mining, block propagation and consensus logic, handing that all over to the Beacon Chain. This event was known as [The Merge](/roadmap/merge/). Once The Merge happened, there were no longer two blockchains; there was just one proof-of-stake Ethereum chain. The Merge also introduced a layered blockchain design, which is why Ethereum now consists of two layers that communicate through the Engine API. Those layers are the consensus layer (i.e. the imported Beacon Chain) and the execution layer (i.e. the original Ethereum blockchain).
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## What does the Beacon Chain do? {#what-does-the-beacon-chain-do}
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The Beacon Chain is the name given to a ledger of accounts that conducted and coordinated the network of Ethereum [stakers](/staking/) before those stakers started validating real Ethereum blocks. It does not process transactions or handle smart contract interactions though because that is being done in the execution layer.
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The Beacon Chain is responsible for things like block and attestation gossip, running the fork choice algorithm, following the head of the chain, and [much more](/developers/docs/nodes-and-clients/node-architecture/#node-comparison).
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The Beacon Chain is responsible for things like block and attestation handling, running the fork choice algorithm, and managing rewards and penalties.
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Read more on our [node architecture page](/developers/docs/nodes-and-clients/node-architecture/#node-comparison).
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## Beacon Chain impact {#beacon-chain-features}
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