diff --git a/Cargo.lock b/Cargo.lock
index a50b69b07..1d1274cf2 100644
--- a/Cargo.lock
+++ b/Cargo.lock
@@ -5876,9 +5876,9 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "lru"
-version = "0.17.0"
+version = "0.18.0"
 source = "registry+https://github.com/rust-lang/crates.io-index"
-checksum = "0e0b564323a0fb6d54b864f625ae139de9612e27edb944dda37c109f05aac531"
+checksum = "8a860605968fce16869fd239cf4237a82f3ac470723415db603b0e8b6c8d4fb9"
 dependencies = [
  "hashbrown 0.17.0",
 ]
@@ -11460,7 +11460,7 @@ dependencies = [
  "jsonrpsee 0.25.1",
  "k256",
  "libp2p",
- "lru 0.17.0",
+ "lru 0.18.0",
  "lz4",
  "once_cell",
  "opentelemetry",
diff --git a/zilliqa/Cargo.toml b/zilliqa/Cargo.toml
index eb66365e5..1ea5ab865 100644
--- a/zilliqa/Cargo.toml
+++ b/zilliqa/Cargo.toml
@@ -115,7 +115,7 @@ arc-swap = "1.9.1"
 redis = { version = "0.32.7", features = ["keep-alive", "r2d2", "tcp_nodelay"], default-features = false }
 alloy = { version = "2.0.4", default-features = false, features = ["consensus", "contract", "dyn-abi", "eips", "hyper", "json-abi", "k256", "rlp", "rpc-types", "rpc-types-trace", "serde", "sol-types"] }
 crossbeam = "0.8.4"
-lru = "0.17.0"
+lru = "0.18.0"
 
 [dev-dependencies]
 alloy = { version = "2.0.4", default-features = false, features = ["consensus", "dyn-abi", "eips", "json-abi", "k256", "rlp", "rpc-types", "rpc-types-trace", "serde", "sol-types", "pubsub", "json-rpc", "contract", "signer-local"] }
diff --git a/zilliqa/src/uccb/relayer.rs b/zilliqa/src/uccb/relayer.rs
index 436059a69..351ea49aa 100644
--- a/zilliqa/src/uccb/relayer.rs
+++ b/zilliqa/src/uccb/relayer.rs
@@ -277,28 +277,26 @@ impl Relayer {
         // do this in an inner-scope to release the lock before calling `relay_ops()` below.
         let promote = {
             // 2. Get the cache entry
-            let bop = self
-                .signatures
-                .write()
-                .get_or_insert_mut_ref(&userop_hash, || {
-                    let stakers = state.get_stakers(block.header).expect("must exist");
-                    let len = stakers.len();
-                    let total_stake: u128 = stakers
-                        .into_iter()
-                        .map(|pub_key| {
-                            state
-                                .get_stake(pub_key, block.header)
-                                .expect("must have stake")
-                                .expect("stake != 0")
-                                .get()
-                        })
-                        .sum();
-                    BlsUserOp {
-                        userop: None,
-                        threshold: 2 * total_stake / 3 + 1,
-                        signatures: Vec::with_capacity(len),
-                    }
-                });
+            let mut cache = self.signatures.write();
+            let bop = cache.get_or_insert_mut_ref(&userop_hash, || {
+                let stakers = state.get_stakers(block.header).expect("must exist");
+                let len = stakers.len();
+                let total_stake: u128 = stakers
+                    .into_iter()
+                    .map(|pub_key| {
+                        state
+                            .get_stake(pub_key, block.header)
+                            .expect("must have stake")
+                            .expect("stake != 0")
+                            .get()
+                    })
+                    .sum();
+                BlsUserOp {
+                    userop: None,
+                    threshold: 2 * total_stake / 3 + 1,
+                    signatures: Vec::with_capacity(len),
+                }
+            });
 
             // 3. Cache the signature entry
             let stake = state