DeSci Ep # 7: How DeSci Bridges Academia and the Startup World—with Niklas Rindtorff of LabDAO

Many independently minded, young scientists are too ambitious for academia… But the startup world isn’t quite right for them either.

 

How might decentralized science provide a space for these innovators to do their work?

 

Niklas Rindtorff is the classical scientist behind LabDAO, an online home for inventors that builds open tools for scientific research. Niklas coauthored his first paper before the age of 20, and he has expertise in CRISPR and cancer research.

 

On this episode of Boost VC, Niklas joins us to explain how classical science emerged after World War II and explore the problems with the NIH grant funding process.

 

Niklas shares his open-access approach to consuming scientific media and describes how DeSci is experimenting with different ways to measures the importance of new science.

 

Listen in to understand how decentralized science can serve as the bridge between research organizations and science startups, building an ecosystem for inventors who don’t fit into the nonprofit or for-profit world.

 

Topics Covered

 

How Niklas defines science

• Formal knowledge generation process
• Fishing at edge of what is known

 

How World War II changed the way we do science

• Conflict won because of US sophisticated tech
• NIH funding created class of full-time scientists
• System doesn’t always maximize progress

 

How the importance of new science is determined

• Measured by citations vs. markets
• DeSci experiments with different accounting

 

How Niklas consumes scientific media

• Used to use few free, open-access journals
• Now leverage Twitter bookmarks, preprints

 

What LabDAO does for scientists

• Provide tools to work wherever they are
• Current focus on computational biology

 

What inspired Niklas to build LabDAO

• Experience with inventions stuck in bureaucracy
• Measure number of patients treated vs. citations

 

The age distribution of NIH grant recipients

• Ages with scientists who were first
• No market discipline, don’t answer to public

 

How we might equalize the demographic of NIH winners

• Create more NIHs
• Private funding agency with philanthropic match

 

How we might invest in a portfolio of science

• Charge higher fee to run research-oriented fund
• Online collectives do research sponsorships

 

How LabDAO itself is funded

• Nonprofit governed by token
• Private investors buy token for stake on projects

 

The relationship between academia and DeSci

• Connective tissue among existing organizations
• Inventors who don’t fit in academia or startups

 

Niklas’ definition of success

• Strive toward personal values
• Invent cool stuff

 

Connect with Niklas RIndtorff

 

LabDAO https://www.labdao.xyz/

LabDAO on Discord https://discord.com/invite/labdao

LabDAO on GitHub https://github.com/labdao

LabDAO on Snapshot https://snapshot.org/#/labdao.eth

LabDAO on Medium https://medium.com/@labdao

LabDAO on Twitter https://twitter.com/lab_dao

Niklas on Twitter https://twitter.com/niklas_tr  

 

Resources

 

Broad Institute https://www.broadinstitute