Decentralized Science and Biotech
Science is essential for human progress. Decentralized science is a way to make science more open and frictionless, from publishing to funding. This will enable more scientific progress by allowing for more people to participate in the scientific process.
What is decentralized science?
Decentralized science is a movement to make scientific research more open and accessible to everyone. It aims to create a more democratic and equitable scientific system by giving people more control over how research is funded, conducted and shared.
Decentralized science is closely associated with open-source research, which promotes transparency and collaboration among scientists. This allows for more radical collaboration and the development of new ideas in the open.
The goal is to make science more open, collaborative and accountable.
Truly global
Biotech is becoming increasingly decentralized, with startups launching outside of major hubs, sharing lab space, hiring across borders, and collaborating on research projects. Decentralized models offer several advantages, such as lowering the barrier to entry for smaller companies and harnessing the talents of a more diverse pool of scientists.
It enables more research to happen and succeed outside of the incumbent system, which is held back by bureaucracy. Decentralized science has the potential to bring funding to researchers more quickly and advance their research more seamlessly. To make it truly successful, we need coordination between desci organizations and demonstration of the advantages of decentralized research, clinical trials etc. Biotech is already moving away from heavy physical setups and footprints, toward more virtual ones. It is outsourcing research processes to CROs and making its information and resources available to more people.
Why Crypto?
The decentralized science movement is an effort to improve science using blockchain. Similar to how blockchain is disrupting other industries, where web2 models of centralized ownership are being challenged by web3 models of decentralized, shared ownership. DeSci efforts range from purely theoretical ideas and small-scale technological experiments to more established players funding university research and launching multiple DAOs of their own.
- Smart contracts could be used to mediate directly between authors and peer reviewers, who would be rewarded with tokens for their review.
- Tokens/NFTs could be used to incentivize scientific communities to share, review, and curate different types of information into resources, such as “smart manuscripts” (which link open-source data and protocols) and article collections.
- The “permaweb” properties of blockchain — where users can store data and information forever, accessible from any location at any time — can be leveraged to guard against scientific censorship (enabled by Arweave, IPFS etc.)
As academic institutions increasingly shift their learning online, DeSci ecosystems may form an attractive alternative to traditional scientific education.
Biotech DAOs
Biotech DAOs are a new way of organizing and incentivizing collaborative research in the biotech space. They have the potential to break Eroom’s law (drug discovery becoming slower and more expensive over time) by enabling new methods of optimizing collaboration, talent, and capital allocation.
VitaDAO is the first example of a biotech DAO and it is focused on funding early-stage preclinical drug development in the context of longevity.
What is an IP-NFT?
An IP-NFT is a patent token. It is a digital asset that represents a patent. The holder of an IP-NFT can use it to prove ownership of the patent and to transfer the patent to another party.
Interesting Reads
- A Guide to DeSci, the Latest Web3 Movement by Sarah Hamburg for A16Z Future
- DeSci Wiki - helpful links and information on decentralized science
- The Emergence of Biotech DAOs by Tyler Golato (Molecule, VitaDAO etc.)
- LabDAO Twitter thread of relevant tweets, articles, videos etc.
- IP-NFTs for Researchers: A New Biomedical Funding Paradigm
- A Model for Biotech Laboratory Infrastructure
- labDAO: How can we leverage global lab networks to accelerate R&D?
- An Open Bazaar for Drug Development: Molecule Protocol
- Atoms: Essay on Atoms Protocol vision from decentralized scientific prizes to publishing
- Tokenized Thought: How Ethereum will Revolutionize Intellectual Property
- Positive Sum Worlds: Remaking Public Goods
Projects
- VitaDAO: DAO/community funding longevity research and initatives
- PsyDAO: DAO/community funding psychedelics research and initatives (in the making)
- labDAO: DAO/community/protocol enabling easier access to labs, cloud labs etc.
- Molecule: protocol and community enabling bio ip-nfts, ip-nft marketplace, kickstarting DAOs such as VitaDAO, PsyDAO
- Opscientia: community of open science activists, researchers, organisers and enthusiasts that have come together to work on the problems of data sharing, reproducibility, incentive alignment, coordination, and intellectual ownership that plague knowledge creation today.
- Gitcoin: DAO/community developing/funding public goods. Popularized quadratic funding.
- Research Hub: Open science journal platform, accelerating the pace of science by rewarding the open sharing and discussion of academic research.
- Atoms: Protocol on everything from decentralized scientific prizes to publishing
- Planck (manuscripts as NFTs) by Matthew Stephenson
- Crowdfund: $QUANTUM: A new meta-experiment begins today: using crypto to crowdfund scientific research.
Disclaimer: I’m directly involved with VitaDAO, PsyDAO, labDAO and Molecule and might indirectly with the others
Decentralized Science Landscape, curated by Jocelynn Pearl —
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