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Alkanes

Alkanes is a metaprotocol that enables smart contracts on Bitcoin L1. Contracts are written in Rust, compiled to WebAssembly, and deployed on-chain through Taproot transactions. No sidechains or bridges required.

Key Concepts​

  • UTXO-native — Contracts operate within Bitcoin's UTXO model
  • Protorunes — Alkanes extends the Runes protocol with programmable token functionality
  • Deterministic state — Contract state is derived entirely from on-chain data; any indexer replaying the same blocks arrives at the same result
  • Metashrew — The open-source indexer framework that tracks Alkanes contract state

What You Can Do​

Rebar Data provides Alkanes access through the JSON-RPC interface:

  • Simulate contract calls without broadcasting a transaction
  • Trace contract execution for debugging
  • Query balances for Protorunes tokens by address, height, or outpoint
  • Inspect contracts — retrieve bytecode and metadata
  • Look up UTXOs — find spendable outputs and map Alkanes IDs to outpoints
  • Encode call data for contract interactions

Use Cases​

  • DeFi on Bitcoin L1 — DEXs, lending, AMMs
  • Composable tokens with programmable logic
  • On-chain automation based on transaction context
  • Cross-protocol composition with Runes

Learn More​