On Friday at the biweekly Ethereum developers meeting, the core developers of the popular cryptocurrency came to an agreement regarding the implementation of a hard fork called Constantinople. This will happen at block 7,080,000. Previously in October, these same developers decided to delay the implementation of Constantinople to the beginning of 2019. This was because of a so-called "consensus issue" that came up when developers attempted a trial upgrade on the digital currency's Ropsten testnet network. At the moment, Ethereum is experiencing a block time of a little more than 14 seconds, and considering that there is a little less than 235,000 blocks left to be mined before they reach block 7,080,000, it is expected that the Constantinople hard fork will occur in about 38 days from now. This corresponds to January 14 of next year. The Constantinople hard fork actually consists of 5 separate proposals. These proposals hope to improve the currency as it transitions from a proof-of-work model to a proof-of-stake consensus model, which is far more energy efficient. Once the hard fork is fully implemented, the Ethereum blockchain will be fundamentally changed. It will then allow synchronous nodes to update the system. Ethereum, which is a public open-source blockchain platform, has features that separate it from other digital currencies such as Bitcoin. In addition to functioning like other cryptocurrencies, it also has the ability to implement smart contracts. It debuted on July 30, 2015, and it has since become the 3rd largest digital currency by market capitalization. Right now, it has a market value of a little under $10 billion and is currently trading at a little more than $95. Not long ago, the University of Basel — which is the oldest university in Switzerland — issued an honorary doctorate to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. The honor was given for "outstanding achievements in fields of cryptocurrencies, smart contracts, and the design of institutions." However, not all recent news relating to the cryptocurrency has been positive. Last month, the University of Maryland and Northeastern University stated that there was a lack of diversity in Ethereum smart contracts and that this could threaten its entire ecosystem.