By Xinwei
TL;DR
Integration of DeSci with Web3 and Blockchain: DeSci integrates blockchain technology to improve key aspects of scientific research such as peer review, funding sponsorship, intellectual property management, and data transparency.
Impact of DeSci on Scientific Research: DeSci is expected to enhance the transparency, efficiency, and democratization of scientific research, while providing new opportunities to address global issues.
Challenges and Future Outlook: Includes improving peer review mechanisms, challenges in funding support, protecting data privacy, and enhancing diverse participation and the integration of DeSci with traditional scientific fields.
What is DeSci
DeSciâs development is closely linked to the rise of Web3 technology, especially blockchain technology. It represents a new approach to scientific research, focusing on using blockchain technology to address fundamental issues in traditional scientific research. DeSciâs development focuses on improving peer review, funding sponsorship, intellectual property management, and enhancing data transparency and scrutiny, which are key elements in the traditional scientific research process.
Key features of DeSci include:
Peer Review and Publishing Process: Traditional scientific publishing is managed by journals, usually involving lengthy peer review and editing work. Blockchain technology, especially smart contracts, can be used to streamline this process. The construction of decentralized communities and the introduction of reputation systems can improve the efficiency and transparency of the process. For example, VitaDAO is an organization that applies blockchain technology in peer review and reputation systems.
Funding Sponsorship: Traditional scientific funding models often involve lengthy application processes and are prone to biases from the review bodies. Blockchain technology provides an alternative way, allowing direct funding of scientific research through crowdfunding. For example, Molecule is a blockchain-based funding market that connects patients, biotech companies, or investors with scientists, driving the development of the open research market.
Intellectual Property Management: In the DeSci field, the introduction of intellectual property NFTs (IP-NFTs) allows researchers to share ownership and future outcomes of research projects. Molecule is a pioneer in this area, enabling scientists, biomedical researchers, and biotech companies to more easily obtain funding and commercialize through IP-NFTs.
Data Transparency and Scrutiny: The application of blockchain technology also increases data transparency, allowing scientific research data to be stored and accessed in a decentralized environment. This helps break data silos and promote collaboration in projects and research.
Impact and Prospects of DeSci:
Simplification of Industrial Transformation: The process of transforming academic achievements into commercial products is usually long and complex due to the ownership of intellectual property rights and complicated procedures in universities or research institutions. DeSci provides new opportunities for the transformation of academic achievements into commercialization, simplifying this process. By building intellectual property NFTs and other innovative mechanisms, DeSci helps researchers more directly transform their scientific findings into commercial products. Additionally, DeSci also helps VCs discover âunder the tableâ projects, i.e., those that are not yet widely known but have potential.
Breaking Traditional Boundaries: DeSci is not limited to the field of scientific research; its concepts and tools are equally applicable to the arts, humanities, and even indigenous knowledge systems. This interdisciplinary collaboration and knowledge sharing are among the key features of DeSci.
Stimulating New Forms of Collaboration: Thanks to its decentralized nature, DeSci promotes global collaboration, especially for projects that require global environmental data and multidisciplinary input. In this way, DeSci hopes to address some of the most urgent global issues, such as climate change and public health crises.
Key Technologies and Applications of DeSci
Blockchain and Smart Contracts: Blockchain plays a core role in DeSci, especially smart contracts. Smart contracts are automatic code segments that can be used to automate various aspects of the scientific publishing process, such as peer review. These contracts ensure transparency and efficiency of the process, also reducing the time and cost of traditional publishing.
Decentralized Peer Review and Publishing Process: DeSci eliminates intermediaries in the traditional publishing process through blockchain technology, such as journal coordination, thereby increasing accessibility and transparency of research findings. For example, Ants Review uses smart contracts to directly involve authors and reviewers, with tokens as incentives to improve the efficiency and quality of peer reviews.
Community Fundraising for Research: Blockchain technology is also used for crowdfunding, allowing scientists to connect directly with patients, biotech companies, or investors, fueling the open research market. This funding model allows scientists to bypass traditional funding channels and receive support directly from the community. For example, Molecule uses NFTs and DAOs to raise funds for scientific research such as drug development.
Intellectual Property Management: In DeSci, NFTs are used to manage and develop intellectual property, such as scientific data or articles. This makes the sharing and transformation of intellectual property more efficient, while also providing a new source of income for scientists and researchers. For example, Molecule uses IP-NFTs to share ownership of research projects and their future outcomes.
Data Transparency and Scrutiny: Data hosted on the blockchain increases the transparency of scientific research, allowing scientists to easily access and store databases related to their research, thereby making more accurate research decisions. DeSci uses a unique feature of blockchain technology â the âpermanent networkâ. This means that once data is uploaded to the blockchain, it is almost impossible to delete or modify. This feature is particularly important for scientific research, as it ensures that scientific data and discoveries remain unchanged and accessible even in the face of political or social pressure. This is especially key in protecting the integrity of scientific research and combating censorship, ensuring the freedom and objectivity of scientific research.
Decentralized Research Tools and Publishing Platforms: DeSci provides multifunctional decentralized platforms, like DeSci Node and LabDAO, to support the research process, including seamless integration of various formats of reports, charts, codes, and external APIs.
Establishment of Reputation Systems: To build a high-quality and trustworthy DeSci community, platforms need to establish comprehensive reputation systems, tracking user interactions on decentralized platforms, such as likes, comments, and posts, to help establish credibility and expertise. Through blockchain, scientistsâ contributions â whether in peer review, sharing research data, or participating in professional training and mentoring â can be recorded and certified by issuing NFTs. These NFTs not only serve as direct evidence of scientistsâ contributions but also as a measure of their reputation in the scientific community. This system encourages scientists to participate in community building and knowledge sharing, while providing a more objective and transparent way to assess and reward their work.
Academic Social Platforms: ResearchGate in web2 has raised over 100M in funding. In contrast, web3 platforms offer a new way for scientists, researchers, and other stakeholders to communicate and collaborate. Through such social platforms, scientists can share research findings, seek partners, and also provide a channel for VCs to discover and invest in potential scientific projects.
DeSci Ecosystem Projects
Molecule
Molecule is a decentralized biotechnology research fundraising platform, currently hosting about 40 scientists seeking funding for their projects. Inspired by the citizen science movement and the openization of drug development, its original idea came from the patient community, aimed at advancing and funding early-stage drug development. Molecule is built on Ethereum and includes two main systems: Molecule Discovery and Molecule Finance. These systems create an active ecosystem for decentralized modular drug development. Molecule uses a combination of smart contracts and legal contracts to form intellectual property NFTs (IP-NFTs), a new mechanism that allows anyone to share ownership of research projects and their future outcomes, such as intellectual property, royalties, data, etc. Molecule is not limited to the basic functions of its own website, but has built a complete and vast ecosystem, allowing patient collectives and drug development DAOs to maintain, manage, and interact with real-world intellectual property.
Data Lake
Data Lake is an innovative medical data donation platform built using blockchain technology, aimed at supporting medical research and the development of artificial intelligence. It establishes a bridge through Polygon and its own token system ($LAKE), connecting patients willing to donate medical data with researchers who need these data. The goal of this platform is to promote the discovery of disease treatment methods and new therapies, thereby improving healthcare services and patient treatment outcomes.
Data Lake operates by obtaining access to medical data from donorsâ healthcare providers, then anonymizing this data so it can be safely used by researchers. Additionally, the platform allows hospitals and data donors to share the economic returns generated by medical data, thereby incentivizing more individuals and institutions to participate in the sharing of medical data. Through this approach, Data Lake not only protects individual privacy but also promotes the advancement of medical research.
GenomesDAO
GenomesDAO is a biotechnology decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) focused on the monetization of genomic data. It combines decentralized finance (DeFi) concepts to ensure the security, privacy, and audibility of genomic data. The main features of GenomesDAO include:
Target Audience:Â GenomesDAO caters to individuals and organizations, offering individuals whole-genome sequencing services, personalized genomic reports, and secure personal DNA vault storage. For organizations, it provides technical support to create secure, participant-owned genomic databases.
Research Support:Â It provides researchers with access to high-quality genomic datasets, helping them understand disease causes and develop new drugs.
Token Usage:Â GENE tokens are used to pay for whole-genome sequencing services and as an incentive mechanism for querying their encrypted DNA data vaults.
GenomesDAO aims to promote the development of genomics research and drug innovation while ensuring the privacy of individuals. Through its platform, GenomesDAO transforms individual genetic data into valuable resources, while ensuring data security and privacy.
HairDAO
HairDAO is a decentralized organization dedicated to the treatment of hair loss, adopting an open-source investment and operational model. It aims to advance the research and development of hair loss treatments in a democratic manner and provide funding support for early-stage hair loss research and related companies.
Some features of HairDAO include:
Diverse Participation: HairDAO encourages the involvement of people with various skills, whether technical or specific domain expertise.
Reward Mechanism: Through its token $HAIR, HairDAO rewards those who contribute to solving the problem of hair loss. Users can earn $HAIR as a reward by uploading their anonymous, encrypted genomic data.
Cultural Characteristics: Although focused on scientific research, HairDAO exhibits a light-hearted and humorous style on its website and Twitter, contrasting with traditional scientific projects. Its content expression and design style are eclectic, even with a certain humor characteristic of silent old movies.
Meme Quality: In the DeSci field, HairDAO stands out with its âhair lossâ theme and light-hearted, humorous image. Its Twitter even uses barbershop emoji symbols, enhancing its meme coin characteristics.
VitaDAO
VitaDAO, initiated by Molecule, is a decentralized biotechnology DAO for drug development and community management, leading in longevity research and development. As the worldâs first biotechnology DAO, VitaDAOâs main goal is to advance longevity research, extending human lifespan and health span.
Some core features of VitaDAO include:
Community Governance: VitaDAO is governed by community members holding $VITA tokens, focusing on funding early longevity research projects.
Funded Projects: It has provided funding for over 20 research projects, totaling over $6 million, covering research on age-related diseases and the exploration of new therapies.
Scope of Research: Supports research projects ranging from basic research to preclinical studies.
Voting Rights of Token Holders: $VITA token holders participate in VitaDAOâs decision-making process, including the selection of funded projects, financial management, and governance activities.
To encourage funding for early-stage longevity biomedicine research, VitaDAO combines innovative governance frameworks and financial tools like DAOs, NFTs, and AMMs. Running on Ethereum, VitaDAO not only jointly funds research but also digitizes research results into IP NFTs. VitaDAOâs Token VITA can be earned by contributing work, capital, or other resources (such as data and IP) to VitaDAO. Members holding VITA not only participate in VitaDAOâs democratic governance, guiding its research direction, but can also profit from its data repository and manage its intellectual property portfolio. This model promotes the innovation and democratization of scientific research, while providing community members with direct opportunities to participate in and benefit from scientific decision-making.
ResearchHub
ResearchHub, founded by Coinbase co-founder Brian Armstrong, is a platform intended to change the traditional scientific journal publishing model. The platform recently completed a $5 million Series A funding on June 15. ResearchHub has created an alternative to traditional journals with its âHubâ system, allowing scientists or scholars to publicly publish and discuss scientific or academic content directly in these centers, bypassing the traditional publishing review process, accelerating the dissemination of information, and undergoing peer review post-publication.
Activities on ResearchHub can earn ResearchCoin (RSC) rewards, an ERC-20 cryptocurrency issued on the Ethereum platform for scientific research. RSC is intended to incentivize the scientific community to share, review, and curate information. Users can earn RSC rewards by:
Sharing PDFs of research papers (provided it does not infringe on copyrights)
Commenting and discussing scientific research
Peer reviewing scientific papers
Receiving RSC tips from other users
Developing open-source features
Additionally, users can set RSC bounties for peer reviews, paper abstracts, or new methods in the lab. They can also fund research by pre-registering projects, raising cryptocurrency in forum posts before the research work begins. According to ResearchHub, activities on the platform continue to grow over time, especially peer review activities being most active and promising.
Challenges and Future Outlook of DeSci
Current technical and operational challenges in the DeSci field
Peer Review Mechanism: In DeSci, peer review remains a critical quality control step. For example, Ants-Review proposed a blockchain-based incentive protocol aimed at addressing the costly, inefficient, and centralized issues in traditional peer review. However, this system still faces key challenges such as determining reviewer qualifications, preventing malicious behavior, and cheating.
Project Funding: Although blockchain provides a new âcrowdfundingâ model, funding for large scientific projects remains a challenge. Small projects can address funding issues with NFT (Non-Fungible Token) models, but large projects often require national-level investment.
Privacy Protection: In DeSci, finding a balance between promoting transparency and collaboration and ensuring data confidentiality is crucial. Zero-knowledge proof (ZKP) technology plays a key role in this regard.
Diverse Participation: The composition of the DeSci community reflects the existing demographic characteristics of the crypto and scientific fields, with underrepresentation of women and other minority groups. This extends beyond gender differences to include diversity in race, geography, and economic background. This lack of diversity could lead to bias and limitations in research directions, restricting the range of problems DeSci can explore and solve. To increase inclusiveness, DeSci projects need to actively attract and encourage wider group participation. This might include providing educational resources, establishing partnerships, and ensuring that a variety of voices are heard in the decision-making process.
Long-term impact and potential development paths of DeSci
Innovative Fundraising Methods: Platforms like Gitcoin offer funding for projects through new mechanisms like quadratic funding.
Intellectual Property Management: For example, the Molecule project has created a new way to manage intellectual property by building IP-NFTs (Intellectual Property Non-Fungible Tokens).
Development of Data Markets: Open data markets will stimulate new forms of collaboration. Innovative database structures like DBDAO allow individuals to benefit from their data.
Importance of Emergency Fundraising: DeSciâs ability to raise research funds during emergencies, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, is particularly important. Traditional government funding is often allocated based on fiscal year budgets, which are not flexible or quick enough in face of emergencies. In contrast, DeSci leverages its decentralized nature to rapidly mobilize resources and focus funds on critical research and response measures. This speed and efficiency are unmatched by traditional fundraising methods. This rapid response in fundraising may become a key tool in responding to global public health emergencies in the future.
How to promote the integration of DeSci with traditional scientific fields
Transparent Funding Use and Management: Drawing on DeFi experience, DeSci can achieve more efficient fund utilization.
Optimization of Resource Sharing: Through smart contracts, scientific equipment and other resources can be shared more conveniently, promoting efficient use of resources.
Facilitation of Global Collaboration: Decentralized science can promote global collaboration, especially for projects requiring global environmental data.
Application of AIGC Technology: Artificial Intelligence Generated Content (AIGC) can be used to improve the productivity of scientific texts, helping to better present research results.
Promoting Open Science and Interdisciplinary Collaboration: DeSci supports and strengthens the concept of open science, making scientific research and data accessible to all, increasing transparency and accessibility. This helps improve the quality and impact of scientific research. The DeSci environment encourages collaboration between different disciplines, breaking down traditional barriers with blockchain and smart contract technology. Interdisciplinary collaboration is particularly important for solving complex problems, such as climate change and public health crises.
Conclusions and Recommendations
- For research institutions and investors, DeSci provides a novel method of scientific funding and project management. For example, the case of VitaDAO shows that through the DeSci model, scientific projects can receive funding from specialized DAOs and be managed through votes by DAO members. This model offers transparency in the funding allocation process and allows funders to participate directly in the decision-making process.
- DeSciâs current main goal is to address funding, organization, and transparency issues in scientific research. Utilizing the transparency and immutability of blockchain technology, DeSci offers a new model for scientific research funding and management. This model could promote closer cooperation between different research institutions and private funders, helping bridge the âvalley of deathâ between basic research and clinical research. It also could provide more opportunities for young scientists to support non-traditional research.
- DeSci greatly enhances the efficiency of academic publishing. By decentralizing the peer review and publishing process, it reduces publishing time and complexity, allowing scientific knowledge to be disseminated more quickly. DeSci, by providing an open and transparent platform, mitigates the monopoly problem in the traditional academic publishing market. This helps increase publication diversity, offering more researchers opportunities to publish, thereby promoting the diversification and democratization of scientific research.
Reference
https://ethereum.org/zh/desci/
https://foresightnews.pro/article/detail/16382
https://foresightnews.pro/article/detail/22045
https://www.odaily.news/post/5182369
https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_22259911?commTag=true
https://www.panewslab.com/zh/articledetails/o82w6dx81n41.html
https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/article/what-is-decentralized-science-aka-desci/
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