# Dan Robinson

> Dan Robinson is General Partner and Head of Research at Paradigm, one of crypto's most influential investment and research firms. A Harvard-trained lawyer turned protocol engineer, Robinson has co-authored landmark papers including the 'Ethereum is a Dark Forest' MEV essay, the Uniswap v3 whitepaper, and the Blend NFT lending protocol. His work sits at the intersection of mechanism design, mathematical finance, and open-source software - making him one of the rare figures who shapes both how DeFi protocols are built and how capital flows into them.

- **Role:** General Partner & Head of Research at Paradigm
- **Organizations:** Paradigm, Uniswap Labs, Chain / Interstellar, Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP
- **Nationality:** American
- **Education:** A.B., Harvard University, J.D., Harvard Law School
- **Known for:** Co-authored Uniswap v3 whitepaper, introducing concentrated liquidity - now the dominant AMM model, Co-authored 'Ethereum is a Dark Forest' - coined the MEV dark forest metaphor that defined an entire field, Designed the Rainbow Network, a novel off-chain synthetic assets exchange over payment channels

## Career timeline

- **pre-2016** — Litigation attorney at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP
- **2016** — Joined Chain as protocol researcher; worked on Ivy smart contract language for Bitcoin
- **2018** — Chain rebranded to Interstellar; continued research on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Plasma, and Stellar
- **2019** — Joined Paradigm as Research Partner; published The Rainbow Network whitepaper
- **2020** — Co-authored 'Ethereum is a Dark Forest' (MEV) and The Yield Protocol
- **2021** — Co-authored Uniswap v3 Core whitepaper introducing concentrated liquidity
- **2023** — Co-authored Blend NFT perpetual lending protocol for Blur
- **2024** — Published am-AMM, pm-AMM, Priority Is All You Need, Everything Is A Perp, Unichain
- **2025** — Co-authored Ethereum Acceleration manifesto; promoted to General Partner
- **2026** — Published PACTs - quantum-resistant Bitcoin address protection mechanism

## Achievements

- Co-authored Uniswap v3 whitepaper, introducing concentrated liquidity - now the dominant AMM model
- Co-authored 'Ethereum is a Dark Forest' - coined the MEV dark forest metaphor that defined an entire field
- Designed the Rainbow Network, a novel off-chain synthetic assets exchange over payment channels
- Co-authored the Yield Protocol and YieldSpace - pioneering fixed-rate DeFi lending
- Co-authored Blend, the first oracle-free perpetual NFT lending protocol (deployed by Blur)
- Co-authored 'Everything Is A Perp' - unified theory of DeFi derivatives
- Co-authored am-AMM (auction-managed AMM) - published at Financial Cryptography 2025
- Co-authored pm-AMM for prediction markets
- Co-authored Priority Is All You Need - introduced MEV taxes for OP Stack L2s
- Co-authored Unichain - Optimism-based L2 for efficient DeFi markets
- Created Ivy - a high-level smart contract language for Bitcoin Script
- Contributed to Uniswap v2 core contracts
- Published PACTs for quantum-resistant Bitcoin protection

## Latest updates

- **2026-05** — Published PACTs - a mechanism for quantum-resistant Bitcoin address protection using STARK proofs
- **2025-01** — Co-authored 'Ethereum Acceleration' manifesto calling for faster Ethereum protocol upgrades
- **2024-11** — Published pm-AMM - an AMM invariant for prediction markets
- **2024-10** — Co-authored Unichain whitepaper with Hayden Adams and others
- **2024-06** — Published 'Priority Is All You Need' introducing MEV taxes for OP Stack L2s
- **2024-03** — Published 'Everything Is A Perp' and am-AMM (auction-managed AMM)

## Links

- Website: https://danrobinson.github.io
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielprobinson/
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/danrobinson
- GitHub: https://github.com/danrobinson

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/dan-robinson
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-02