Since 2018, Molecule has been at the forefront of decentralized science (DeSci). By helping to build the first biotech DAO - VitaDAO - and by creating core DeSci infrastructure like the IP-NFT framework we have laid the foundation for the next generation of builders in DeSci to emerge and reshape the life sciences. Through this process, Molecule and the DeSci community have learned a tremendous amount about building at the intersection of web3 and bio.

We are pleased to announce that Molecule’s IP-NFT funding framework will facilitate critical preclinical work in Dr. Amit Sharma’s laboratory at the SRF Research Center to eliminate the accumulation of senescent cells in age-related diseases.

Ethan Perlstein, a well-known biotech founder and rare diseases advocate recently posted on Twitter that: "once you get a taste of decentralized biotech "it’s hard to go back to the centralized carnival of yore." It's as though he was talking about decentralized science (DeSci) itself. No event gave you this feeling better than the recent DeSci.Berlin gathering.

Today, we are excited to announce that we have raised $12.7M in seed funding. Led by Northpond Ventures with participation from Shine Capital, 1kx, Fifty Years, KdT Ventures, BACKED VC, Inflection VC, Chris Leiter, Balaji Srinivasan, Zee Prime Capital, The LAO, L1 Digital, Boom Capital, Compound VC, Koji Capital, Pillar VC, Seedclub Ventures, Speedinvest, Healthspan Capital, BoxGroup and many others - we are now one step closer to creating a more equitable future for researchers and patients.

We are delighted to share that the laboratory of Evandro Fang at the Akershus University Hospital and the University of Oslo became the third ever lab to fund their research project via Molecule’s IP-NFT framework - The discovery of novel mitophagy activators for Alzheimer´s disease and healthy longevity.

A blossoming Decentralized Science (DeSci) movement is changing the biopharma landscape by enabling the formation of patient- and researcher-centric communities building with an open-source ethos.

TL;DR: This week, the first university biomedical intellectual property (IP) and research project was funded as an NFT (non-fungible token), enabled by a pioneering innovation at Molecule. The IP-NFT enables new fundraising and collaboration strategies for researchers by combining legal and technical frameworks with NFT technology. Early-stage research can be financed without endless grant applications, creating a startup and raising VC or needing to file a patent.

Throughout the past 2 weeks VitaDAO Token Holders got to vote on the proposal “VDP-5 Scheibye-Knudsen Lab Funding” to fund longevity at the Scheibye-Knudsen Lab in Copenhagen. The voting passed with 2.1M token votes and 88% of votes supporting the proposition. With the proposal having been approved by the DAO members, the lab in Copenhagen will receive $250.000 for the first research phase of the project over a period of 12 months. After successful completion and review of Phase 1 by the DAO, another $250.000 for an additional 12 months of research could be handed out to the lab. As part of this deal, VitaDAO will fully own the intellectual property (IP) resulting from the research project. The first biopharma IP that will be owned and managed by a DAO. Ownership and access management to the IP will be handled via Molecule’s novel IPNFT framework. The infrastructure is utilizing Ethereum ERC721, Arweave and Nevermined.

Imagine a world where patients directly fund researchers developing the next therapeutic breakthrough they need. One where drug development is collaborative, open, and decentralized — an open bazaar anyone with the right intentions can join. A system that could radically increase the diversity of treatments, and lower costs and time to market.

The pharmaceutical industry is facing a wide variety of challenges, but perhaps the most pressing is the ongoing innovation crisis. Drug discovery rates are declining, the price of bringing a drug to market is increasing, and ROI on R&D is expected to hit 0% in the next few years. Taken together, these factors have a direct impact on the number and types of therapeutics being brought to market. In light of the capital requirements being so high, drug discovery represents a special challenge for its actors, especially pharmaceutical and biotech companies and universities. Compounding these problems, industry and academia struggle with an unprecedented reproducibility crisis. Today, two innovative companies have joined forces to fight these trends.

We decided to create an integration between the Ocean Protocol and Molecule Catalyst, to enable DAO like management of research data produced from the projects funded via Molecule Catalyst, as well as monetize the research data to improve the value of the Molecule Catalyst markets for contributors.

We are excited to announce the launch of the first application built for the Molecule Protocol on Ethereum Mainnet. Molecule Catalyst provides a platform for researchers working on novel therapeutics to raise funding from the public. Our mission is to democratize research funding and allow the public to engage with researchers while new discoveries are happening.

We recently announced the release of our first iteration of the Molecule platform, Catalyst, an initiative offering novel funding mechanisms for research projects. By tokenizing a fundraising initiative, each project becomes a tradeable market where users contribute to research in underfunded areas of science and directly invest in the success of the campaign. Unlike existing crowdfunding platforms, Catalyst offers incentive-driven fundraising where backers can potentially earn a return on their contribution.This article outlines the architecture of our application, delving into how we are leveraging token engineering concepts to benefit the future of health and medicine through funding research.