Danny Willems -- Work In Progress

A mathematician dreaming about describing the Universe with equations and symbols.

Ecosystems & Products

Repositories I have contributed to, grouped by the ecosystem or product they belong to: the Mina, Zcash and Tezos blockchains, and the LeakIX security platform. Each ecosystem has three tabs: repositories I contributed to (with a link to my individual commits in each), blog articles, and documentation I worked on. Repository entries list my role, the period of involvement, and the current state of the repository. The content of this page is configured in _data/ecosystems.yml.

Mina Blockchain website

Mina is a layer-1 blockchain that stays a constant size (~22 KB) by recursively composing zero-knowledge proofs. During my time at o1Labs I worked across the protocol, its proof systems, and the full rewrite of the node in Rust.

MinaProtocol/mina maintained

The reference Mina node. Contributions to Pickles (the recursion layer) and the broader cryptography stack.

OCaml Core contributor 2023 - 2026 my contributions

The proof systems powering Mina. Work on Kimchi (the PlonK-based prover), custom gates and lookups, the Arrabbiata folding scheme, and the o1VM zkVM for MIPS.

Rust Core contributor / maintainer 2023 - 2026 my contributions

Full rewrite of the Mina node from OCaml to Rust, aiming to improve performance, maintainability and developer accessibility.

Rust Core contributor 2025 - 2026 my contributions
o1-labs/o1js maintained

TypeScript framework for writing zk-SNARKs and zkApps on Mina.

TypeScript Contributor 2023 - 2025 my contributions
o1-labs/snarky maintained

OCaml DSL for verifiable computation, the foundation of Mina's circuits.

OCaml Contributor 2023 - 2025 my contributions

Tool to generate specifications from Rust code and comments, used to document the proof-systems library.

Rust Contributor 2023 - 2025 my contributions
o1-labs/ocaml-gen maintained

Automatic generation of OCaml bindings from Rust, bridging proof-systems with the OCaml node.

Rust Contributor 2023 - 2025 my contributions

Reference C implementation of the Mina transaction signer.

C Contributor 2023 - 2025 my contributions
MinaProtocol/docs2 maintained

Documentation website for the Mina Protocol.

JavaScript Contributor 2023 - 2025 my contributions

No blog articles yet.

No documentation yet.

Zcash Blockchain website

Zcash is a privacy-preserving cryptocurrency that uses zk-SNARKs to shield transactions. I contribute to the Rust wallet and protocol libraries, with earlier contributions to the original zcashd node.

zcash/librustzcash maintained

Core Rust crates implementing the Zcash protocol: Sapling, Orchard, transaction building and wallet logic.

Rust Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions
zcash/wallet active

Next-generation Rust wallet replacing the legacy zcashd wallet.

Rust Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions

Note encryption interfaces and convenience methods for the Sapling and Orchard protocols.

Rust Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions
zcash/zcash-devtool maintained

CLI tool for developers prototyping Zcash functionality.

Rust Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions

Fork of the nheqminer Equihash miner for Zcash. Modest improvements to repository hygiene and status.

C++ Contributor my contributions

Documentation for Orchard, the Halo 2-based shielded protocol used by Zcash.

dannywillems.github.io Author

Documentation for halo2, the PLONKish proving system underpinning Orchard.

dannywillems.github.io Author

Documentation for zcashd, the original Zcash full node.

dannywillems.github.io Author

Documentation for Zebra, the Rust implementation of a Zcash node.

dannywillems.github.io Author

Documentation for librustzcash, the Rust crates implementing the Zcash protocol.

dannywillems.github.io Author

Tezos Blockchain website

Tezos is a self-amending blockchain with on-chain governance. At Nomadic Labs I worked on the protocol's cryptography stack: pairing curves, finite-field and polynomial libraries, proof systems and rollups. This work lives on GitLab.

tezos/tezos (Octez) maintained

Octez, the reference OCaml implementation of the Tezos protocol. Contributions to the cryptography and rollup stack.

OCaml Contributor 2019 - 2023 my contributions

Efficient OCaml implementation of the pairing-friendly curve BLS12-381: (i)FFT, G1/G2/GT operations, hash-to-curve, Pippenger MSM and pairings. Used by Octez.

OCaml Author / maintainer 2020 - 2023 my contributions

Efficient C and OCaml implementations of hash functions (Anemoi, Poseidon, Rescue, Griffin) over the scalar field of BLS12-381.

OCaml Author / maintainer 2022 - 2023 my contributions

OCaml implementation of BLS signatures for BLS12-381, following the IRTF CFRG draft. Used by Tezos rollups (TORU and SCORU).

OCaml Author / maintainer 2021 - 2023 my contributions

A monadic DSL embedded in OCaml for building circuits for aPlonK. Sporadic contributions, e.g. new primitives and peer-coding.

OCaml Contributor 2021 - 2023 my contributions

Modular Experimental Cryptography library: finite fields and elliptic-curve primitives for experimental protocols in OCaml.

OCaml Author / maintainer 2020 - 2023 my contributions

Finite-field library in OCaml: module types and functors to instantiate prime fields easily.

OCaml Author / maintainer 2020 - 2023 my contributions

Polynomials over finite fields in OCaml, including (i)FFT routines.

OCaml Author / maintainer 2020 - 2023 my contributions

OCaml wrapper for Chia's class-group based VDF, used by the Tezos Kathmandu protocol to improve randomness generation.

OCaml Contributor 2022 my contributions

Contiguous C arrays in OCaml for cache-friendly handling of large arrays and a simpler FFI surface.

OCaml Author / maintainer 2022 - 2023 my contributions

Optimised OCaml bindings to the Rust arkworks library, investigated as the low-level backend for Epoxy (Tezos validity rollups).

OCaml Author 2022 - 2023 my contributions

No blog articles yet.

No documentation yet.

LeakIX Security platform website

LeakIX is a search engine and attack-surface monitoring platform for exposed services and misconfigurations. As a part-time contributor I work on the API clients and tooling that support the platform.

Python client for the LeakIX API.

Python Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions

Python bindings for l9format, the network-recon interoperability format used across the LeakIX tooling.

Python Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions

MCP server for the LeakIX API, exposing security research and reconnaissance to AI assistants.

Python Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions
LeakIX/DocSite maintained

Documentation site for LeakIX.

Makefile Contributor 2026 - Present my contributions

No blog articles yet.

No documentation yet.