About a year or two ago, some friends in the circle had a special conversation with me about the topic of DeSci.
The so-called DeSci is the abbreviation of Decentralized Science.
At that time, I had heard the word, and I could also roughly guess its meaning from the literal meaning.
At that time, DeSci was not yet popular, and DePIN was more popular, especially the many DePIN projects combined with GPU computing power - like the early Filecoin proposed, using decentralized, scattered GPU computing power.
But I hold a very cautious attitude towards these so-called DePIN projects, because I think they will most likely end up like Filecoin - it's not really using idle scattered computing power, but becoming a competition between giant computing power centers, completely deviating from the original intention of the project.
Influenced by such projects, I thought at the time that the so-called "DeSci" might also be trying to do something similar, gathering scattered scientific researchers around the world through token incentives to do scientific research.
I think this way of doing scientific research may not be easy to popularize on a large scale, and it may not be a real application of encryption technology.
Although the open source code community has developed in this way, I think it is still uncertain whether scientific research can be developed in this way.
So at that time, I expressed a very cautious view on the DeSci mentioned by my friend.
Unexpectedly, these days, the concept of DeSci has suddenly become popular in the circle again, especially a DeSci project in the field of biotechnology, Bio Protocol, which is the most popular.
About this project, TechFlow has a good article introducing it, and the reference link of the article is attached at the end.
This project is mainly to fund some projects in the field of biotechnology, and its funding method is mainly carried out in the form of DAO, with a DAO initiated for each direction/project.
The official website (https://app.bio.xyz/genesis) currently shows that there are already 8 DAOs established. Each of these 8 DAOs has issued its own token.
Taking one of them, VitaDAO, as an example, from the official website of this DAO (https://www.vitadao.com/), we can see that its funding direction is longevity technology.
Scientific researchers can apply for funding for their research projects on the official website. After review by VitaDAO, the holders of this DAO token will vote to decide whether to provide funding for the project.
This approach is clearly different from what I previously understood about DeSci:
This approach uses encryption technology/crypto assets more in the project review and funding aspects, rather than in the way of doing scientific research in a decentralized manner as I previously understood.
I think this approach is worth trying. If DeSci is evolving in this direction, it is worth further tracking and observing.
In fact, I strongly agree with exploring similar approaches in more fields, such as the research and development of language models and AI agents using crypto assets that I have shared before.
However, the project tokens, including VitaDAO, currently have little economic empowerment, mainly governance functions. So whether these DAO tokens are worth investing in is another matter.
In addition, there has been an interesting little twist in this track these days: on a website called Pump.Science, there have appeared tokens related to biotechnology.
Many people say these tokens are purely meme coins, but they are actually a bit different.
Pure meme coins are driven solely by artificial narratives and emotions, but the tokens on Pump.Science are currently linked to the progress of research projects. The projects represented by the tokens will update the progress of their research at regular intervals.
This is slightly more "rational" than pure meme coins, although it remains to be seen whether the data support is truly reliable and meaningful.
Reference link:
https://www.techflowpost.com/article/detail_21702.html
