Mechanism Capital founder predicts the growth of tokens’ capitalization of DeSci projects similar to DeFi protocols

What’s new? Andrew Kang, the founder and partner of the crypto venture company Mechanism Capital, turned his attention to the emerging sector of decentralized science (DeSci) protocols. According to the entrepreneur, what is happening now with such projects is reminiscent of the situation with decentralized financial (DeFi) protocols in 2019. Back then, they were just emerging, were not appreciated by the market, but already had huge potential.

Source: X.com

What else is known? According to Kang, DeSci projects are also in the development and experimentation phase now, and are likely to significantly change their products and economic models in the future before moving to scale. He again cited the experience of DeFi protocols, particularly Sky (formerly Maker), Synthetix, and Aave, which were “clunky, microcaps” at launch but have now grown into major lending platforms.

DeSci projects are designed to make it easier to raise funds for scientific research and to disseminate the results of this research. In the traditional approach, scientists may face difficulties in obtaining grants for highly specialized or irrelevant research that officials consider irrelevant, as well as publishing results in scientific journals that may be controlled by interested parties.

The use of blockchain allows DeSci projects to raise funding through crowdfunding, native token staking and NFT sales, as well as to secure authorship of papers and eliminate the middleman between research authors and reviewers.

In addition, DeSci projects offer an alternative to the Hirsch index (h-index), on which the reputation of scientists currently largely depends. It reflects a scientist’s relevance in the community by taking into account the number of his/her publications and references to these publications in other people’s papers. DeSci teams propose to take into account other achievements, including professional development, mentoring, and assistance in other people’s projects.

Finally, DeSci projects allow scientists around the world to come together outside of government organizations, potentially improving research productivity and overall progress.

DeSci, like DeFi projects, are run by decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) composed of native token holders.

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Andrew Kang considers BIO Protocol, Pump Science, and GLP1 to be the most interesting projects in this segment.

BIO Protocol with the Ethereum blockchain-based BIO native token enables scientists, patients, and investors around the world to fund, develop and co-own new medicines through the Biotech DAO.

The DAO is currently focused on projects in the areas of cryopreservation, women’s health, the use of psychedelics to improve mental health, drugs for COVID-19, and rare diseases, and the development of quantum microscopes to observe quantum biological phenomena.

The ultimate goal of the project is to create an autonomous infrastructure for funding AI-based science, drug development, and open-source computational biology.

BIO Protocol plans to expand to Solana and other blockchains in Q1, 2025. The project has already raised funding from the largest centralized crypto exchange (CEX) Binance. Andrew Kang also participated in the latest funding round.

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The Pump Science platform offers users a gamified way to participate in experiments to increase longevity. Drug developers can raise funds for experiments and protect the rights to their discoveries, while users can bet on which intervention will extend the life of real test organisms (worms, flies, and mice).

To fund an experiment on a particular intervention, drug creators launch a token, which represents a partial development right, and sell it to cover the costs of the experiments.

The rights to drugs developed through the platform can be licensed, and the drugs themselves can be sold as supplements or research chemicals.

The tokens are launched through the largest Solana-based PumpFun meme token launchpad. If the market capitalization of the asset reaches certain thresholds, it is automatically sold to fund the experiment. The research is being conducted at Ora Biomedical and Tracked Biotechnologies.

The platform currently features assets Rifampicin (RIF) with a capitalization of $104,8 million and Urolithin A (URO) with a capitalization of $40,4 million, both traded on Raydium, the largest decentralized crypto exchange (DEX) on the Solana network.

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The third project Andrew Kang mentioned was GLP1. The creators claim that this is the first DeSci protocol dedicated to extending the use of GLP-1 therapy to humans and animals (in veterinary medicine).

GLP-1 or glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) is used in the treatment of diabetes and obesity. The slogan of the project, referring to the slogan of Donald Trump’s previous presidential campaign, is Making America Skinny Again.

The project offers a token GLP1 based on Solana, the growth of capitalization of which determines the transition to the next stage of research of the substance, subject to the approval of the community.

At a capitalization of $25 million, research will be conducted on mice, after reaching $100 million — on dogs and cats, $500 million — on pigs and monkeys, $2 billion — on bears and gorillas, $5 billion or more — on large rare animals such as hippos, lions, and elephants.