DeSci: How to use on-chain Meme to challenge the existing scientific research system?

Written by: Ac-Core, YBB Capital Researcher

TL;DR

• The birth of the DeSci hot spot mainly stems from Binance Labs' investment in BIO Protocol, CZ's new direction speech involved biotechnology adoption, CZ and Vitalik discussed DeSci together, and a16z led the investment in the DeSci project AmionChain;

• If DeSci is regarded as a meme, its fundamentals, compared with memes in different directions such as zoos, AI, and art, require stronger narratives and character platforms, and it also has greater potential to break the circle;

• In practical terms, the current economic volume available in the DeSci market is not enough to support the expenditure of scientific research funds. The current DeSci It is still in the early stages of the "market value dream", and hot speculation is just a necessity.

1. Background

1.1 What is DeSci

The more official explanation is that DeSci (Decentralized Science) is decentralized science, which aims to build a public infrastructure for scientific research through the fair and equal use of Web3 technology, focusing on solving problems such as review, scientific research funding, intellectual property management, and data transparency and review mechanisms.

The more vernacular explanation is that DeSci gives the pure speculation of the currency circle to the zero speculation of scientific research. But DeSci is not a new concept that has only appeared this year. VitaDAO, which focuses on funding and promoting early longevity scientific research, was established as early as 2021, and even received investment from Pfizer, a world-renowned pharmaceutical company. But DeSci has been developing slowly and has not received much attention from the market until recently when Binance Labs announced its investment in BIO Protocol and CZ and Vitalik participated in the DeSci conference, which brought the track back into the public eye.

1.2 The birth of hot spots

• BIO Protocol exclusively invests in BIO Protocol:

BIO Protocol can be seen as a crowdfunding platform for raising funds for scientific projects, which obtains funds through token sales and uses these funds to support and promote the development of biotechnology projects. Intellectual property rights exist in the form of IPT (Intellectual Property Token) of the Molecule protocol and are shared by participants.

The proceeds from the sale of intellectual property and products by BioDAO will flow back to the BioDAO treasury to fund the next generation of research and development projects. Binance Labs said: "BIO can be regarded as the Y Combinator of on-chain science." Currently, the total value of the 100 startups with the highest valuation or market value under Y Combinator has exceeded 100 billion US dollars, including well-known companies such as Airbnb, Coinbase, Stripe, and Reddit.

• CZ's new direction speech includes biotechnology and discussing DeSci with Vitalik:

In his first speech after being released from prison at the Binance Blockchain Week in Dubai in 2024, CZ expressed his relationship with artificial intelligence and biotechnology in the following words: "Now I mainly do two things: one is Google Academy, and the other is investment. Investment is mainly concentrated in the three fields of blockchain, artificial intelligence and biotechnology." CZ then attended the DeSci Day event held by Binance in Bangkok and discussed DeSci with Vitalik. This move triggered heated discussions in the market, and the prices of tokens of various DeSci projects rose sharply.

• a16z leads the investment in DeSci project AmionChain:

AminoChain recently announced that it has received a $5 million seed round of financing led by a16z. Together with the investment from private funds such as Cercano, the total financing amount has reached $7.8 million. Its vision is to build a decentralized "biobank" on L2, allowing researchers to easily find and access samples, while patients retain control and receive compensation for the use of their data.

Image source: X(@BinanceLabs)

II. Real needs and real use cases of DeSci

Image source: See extended link 1

In 2023, China's R&D expenditure exceeded 3.3 trillion yuan (about 4585 2 billion yuan), up 8.1% year-on-year. Among them, the investment in basic research was 221.2 billion yuan, an increase of 9.3%. Compared with the past, China has maintained a relatively high growth rate in recent years, especially in high-tech and basic scientific research, showing the driving force of the strategy of building a strong country in science and technology (see extended link 2 for data).

Comparison of the growth of scientific research expenditure: China's scientific research funding has grown rapidly, especially in the field of basic research, which shows the country's determination to innovate science and technology and its emphasis on high-end science and technology. Although the United States has a higher absolute amount, its growth rate is relatively stable, and it focuses on investing in areas that have long-term technological cutting-edge advantages.

From the actual application of DeSci, it is currently more at the narrative stage of Meme, and it is difficult to directly promote the development of science and technology. Whether it is donations driven by narrative empathy or market flows brought about by speculative transactions, the existing economic scale is still far from enough to support the huge expenditure required for scientific research. Therefore, DeSci is still in the early stages of the "market value dream". If DeSci wants to be truly implemented in the future, it not only needs to meet regulatory requirements, but also needs to obtain the continued support of powerful and influential people.

2.2 DeSci’s real-life academic finance case: South Korea’s LK-99 room-temperature superconducting event

Image source: Taj Quantum - Official website of Taiji Quantum in the United States

2023 is known as the "Year of Room-Temperature Superconductivity", mainly due to several studies claiming to have discovered room-temperature superconductors, which has attracted widespread attention from the global scientific community. However, as subsequent investigations have deepened, these findings have proven to be seriously problematic and have even sparked an academic scandal.

The beginning of the incident Langa Dias, a physicist at the University of Rochester in New York, published a paper in the journal Nature, claiming to have discovered a material that can achieve superconductivity at room temperature. The discovery was initially seen as a major breakthrough because the emergence of room-temperature superconductors could revolutionize technological development in the fields of energy transmission, medical devices, and electronic components. Typically, superconductors need to work at extremely low temperatures (below -196 degrees Celsius), and superconductors that can operate at room temperature have always been the goal pursued by the scientific community. However, Dias's research has been questioned since its publication, especially since his academic reputation was controversial in 2020 due to similar research.

As early as 2020, Dias became famous for a paper on room-temperature superconductors, but the paper was retracted by Nature two years later. Despite this, Dias published a similar study again in 2023, which attracted attention again. However, many of his peers accused him of manipulating data and even plagiarizing the content of his doctoral thesis. Several well-known media, including The Wall Street Journal and Science magazine, have investigated him and exposed the problems in his research. The University of Rochester also launched several internal investigations into Dias, and eventually external experts confirmed that his paper had "data reliability issues", which led to the revocation of his authority to manage laboratories and students. In November 2023, Nature magazine officially withdrew his latest research paper on room-temperature superconductors.

The inside story behind this scandal has gradually surfaced. According to the investigation of the news team of Nature magazine, members of Dias' research team did not observe the key superconducting phenomenon "Meissner effect" in the experiment, but received the manuscript of the paper sent by Dias in a short time and were asked to cooperate in submitting it. These graduate students were puzzled by some of the experimental data in the paper, but under the authority and pressure of their mentor, they did not question these issues publicly in the end. Subsequently, more reviewers and experts expressed doubts about Dias' experimental data and found that his data might have been tampered with.

At the same time that Dias's first paper was questioned, he claimed to have discovered room temperature superconductivity in another material (LuH, a compound of lutetium and hydrogen). But the measurement data of this study is also full of problems. Many students pointed out that there were systematic errors in the experimental results, and they even thought they were "deceiving themselves." Faced with more and more doubts, Dias still chose to promote the publication of the paper, but 8 of the 11 co-authors finally decided to request a withdrawal.

This series of academic scandals not only caused a serious reputational blow to Dias himself, but also affected the entire scientific research field. The career prospects of many young scientists have become uncertain due to their participation in these studies, and the trust of the academic community has also been damaged. Paul Canfield, a physicist at Iowa State University, said, "This scandal has damaged the careers of young scientists, especially those in the field of superconductivity."

At the same time, another protagonist in the field of room-temperature superconductivity, the LK-99 team in South Korea, has been involved in similar controversies. Although they claimed to have discovered a new "room-temperature superconductor" - PCPOSOS again in 2024, many people in the scientific community have expressed doubts about the authenticity of their research. The data presented by the team at the academic conference was similar to that of the previous LK-99 study and lacked sufficient verification support. After the news of the breakthrough in superconductor technology was released, some Korean stocks related to superconductivity in the stock market attracted a large number of investors. South Korean superconducting concept small-cap stocks such as Duksung Co. and Sunam Co. rose by 30% for the third consecutive trading day. Sunam Co. has soared about 260% in the past six trading days, and Duksung has risen 170%. Mobiis Co. rose 30% on Thursday, while Shinsung Delta Tech Co. briefly rose 21% to a record high.

Later in the incident, the verification committee of the Korean Superconducting Society said that LK-99 did not show the Meissner effect and could not prove that it was a superconductor. The news caused fluctuations in Chinese superconducting concept stocks, and the share prices of Farsens and Zhongfu Industrial fell sharply. The former did not get involved in superconducting technology, and the latter only provided site and equipment support. At the same time, the share price of American Superconductor fell 29%, and Sumitomo Electric Industries also fell due to poor performance.

3. DeSci Ecosystem Overview

3.1 BIO Protocol

BIO Protocol, which has received investment from Binance Labs, has been named the "Y Combinator of on-chain science" and is used to incubate early-stage companies and provide funds and resources to accelerate project development. According to the content of "TechFlow", the main components include BioDAO, curation system, liquidity and IP, and incentive mechanism.

Image source: Shenchao TechFlow - Interpretation of BIO Protocol - BioDAO

$VITA ( VitaDAO ): VitaDAO was founded in 20 21 $RSC(ResearchCoin): used to reward users' contributions on the ResearchHub platform, aiming to accelerate scientific research by incentivizing contributions within the community. Anyone can earn $RSC by sharing, curating and discussing academic science within ResearchHub; $ATH(AthenaDAO): AthenaDAO is a decentralized community of researchers, funders and advocates dedicated to advancing women's health research, education and funding; $GROW (ValleyDAO): a decentralized organization focusing on anti-aging drugs and life longevity projects.

3.2 Pump.Science

Solana Ecosystem DeSci Platform Molecule DAO is a Meme launch platform launched at the Solana Breakpoint 2024 conference. Pump.science will issue Meme tokens representing medicines on Pump.fun. Its related concept tokens are:

$RIF: Rifampicin (Rifampicin), according to the official website: "Rifampicin is an antibiotic that has attracted attention for its amazing effects on aging. In microorganisms such as Caenorhabditis elegans (a model organism often used in aging research), rifampicin has been shown to activate the cell's natural defense mechanisms to resist stress and damage. Imagine it as a "cell coach" that encourages cells to stay healthy and resilient by protecting them from harmful oxidative stress and maintaining the quality of intracellular proteins. These protective effects help worms live longer and healthier."

3.4 DeSci Quantum Meme

$ANTI- Antitoken and $PRO - Protoken: The two are a pair of token combinations, expressing the attitude of support and opposition to Meme Token respectively. They were founded by algorithm engineer and mathematical physics expert @sshmatrix_, 1 $ANTI= 1$PRO rises and falls together.

Fourth, how long can the elixir on the chain last

DeSci is not a concept that has only appeared this year. Its sudden popularity is mainly due to the three factors that Binance Labs invested in BIO Protocol, CZ and Vitalik discussed DeSci together, and a16z led the investment in the DeSci project AmionChain. The market also needs the promotion of "pulling the market is justice". Looking at the current market, DeSci is still mainly driven by Meme, but its fundamental attributes are different from other Meme logics.

• Different from other memes: Compared with memes in different directions such as AI, zoos, and art, DeSci needs a more influential person to "bring goods" in terms of attributes. It may be difficult to support it relying solely on traffic within the circle, and it needs real people outside the circle with "scientific research" attributes;

• The valuation of leading projects needs to continue to rise: At present, the DeSci track has not yet produced a leading project with a market value of 1 billion. Compared with memes in other tracks, it still has great market potential. Mainstream centralized exchanges have not yet listed related tokens, and there has been no large-scale financing at the first level;

• DeSci may have greater potential to break the circle: The current PVP market is highly competitive, but if an outsider with a "scientist" background uses DeSci's narrative to donate or raise funds, there will be more room for development. Similar to the crowdfunding of $PEOPLE to purchase the rare original copy of the U.S. Constitution, and the auction of the NFT of "Everyday: The First 5000 Days" at Christie's for a high price of $69.34 million, Musk brought $DOGE to the moon. DeSci and these cases all show similar core logic, and the marketing effect is comparable to Jia Yueting's plan to build a car in the cryptocurrency circle with a PPT.