The VitaDAO community has been hard at work this year pioneering the future of longevity research and IP-NFTs. These past few weeks have been particularly exciting! In this December edition of the VitaDAO Newsletter you will find updates on what has happened!
It’s officially the holiday season🎄. We are very excited to begin to bring you a monthly VitaDAO newsletter! There is so much going on in the VitaDAO community. By putting things in one place, we hope it will be easier to keep up with all of VitaDAO’s moving pieces (there’s a lot!). You can expect updates on VitaDAO community news, journal club updates, summaries of active proposals, and upcoming community events. We welcome any feedback, comments, or suggestions✏️.
What is VitaDAO?
VitaDAO is a decentralized organization made up of individuals from across the globe working to fund early-stage longevity research. At its core, VitaDAO functions as an ecosystem with three moving parts: the DAO, the researchers, and their IP.
Members of the DAO govern the community and agree on projects that should be funded. Researchers within and outside the community then perform their non-profit research projects and generated IP is digitized in the form of IP-NFTs. Any proceeds added to the treasury by selling IP-NFTs to for-profit entities are used to fund future research.
Check out the VitaDAO Whitepaper for more information on VitaDAO governance and IP-NFT technicals.
Members can join VitaDAO by purchasing $VITA tokens or earning them through contributions of work or Intellectual Property. Want to purchase $VITA’s governance token? Read through the VitaDAO guide on how to purchase $VITA.
Community News
This month was a big month for VitaDAO. There were proposals, a historical second IP-NFT was issued, and exciting things are stirring for $VITA holders. Below is a summary of all the many things that happened in the VitaDAO community this month.
VDP-16 Passed
We have our second project funded by Vita DAO 🚀🚀 This is a historic moment in Vita DAO history and longevity history as a whole. The Korolchuk lab will be the second research project that will be funded through Vita DAO and IP-NFTs.
The Korolchuk lab is researching how to identify novel bioactive autophagy inducers to be used in drug discovery. Full details of the VDP-16 proposal are publicly available and can be read on the VitaDAO governance forum.
Watch a recording of the public celebration of the IP-NFT transfer:
Vita DAO VDP-14 passed!
This means that Tier 3 Governance is moving to Snapshot, making voting free! Current proposals in the VitaDAO community must pass through three tiers. Tier 1 occurs on Discord and relies on informal votes in the form of reactions and comments.
Tier 2 occurs on the Discourse governance forum and relies on off-chain votes. Tier 3 had previously taken place on-chain. If you have done anything on-chain recently, you know the struggle of gas fees these days⛽️😫. Snapshot can take a snapshot of $VITA holders and quantities at different blocks on the Ethereum Mainnet.
In taking this snapshot, staking $VITA will no longer be required to vote and governance will be easier, cheaper, and more accessible to all $VITA hodlers. Such an exciting change in the voting structure!
VitaDAO VDP-15 passed!
This vote verifies agreement regarding the Longevity Working Group’s assessment of the Rubedo Life Science Company. Rubedo Life Science Company shows promise in its ability to develop a senolytic prodrug and is composed of a talented team of scientists.
VitaDAO VDP-17 passed!
This vote approves financing a feasibility study to establish a new kind of model for drug development that also leverages IPNFTs and smart contracts. Crowd Funded Cures’ mission is to implement pay-for-success smart contracts. Pay-for-success smart contracts are an on-chain version of Social Impact Bonds, the funding of effective social services through performance-based contracts.
VDP-17 proposed providing $40,000 to Crowd Funded Cures to commission a feasibility study from a leading consulting firm on this new model of research funding. This is relevant to VitaDAO as this analysis will back a financial model VitaDAO can use in the future to fund off-patent clinical trials. Ultimately, this might allow Vitalians to support a future Generic Longevity Drug Repurposing IP-NFT, which would benefit VitaDAO and the broader community.
VitaDAO stopped selling $VITA….for a few hours.
On December 13th, a Genesis contributor was tricked out of 500k worth of $VITA. In response, the VitaDAO team moved fast, as members of the VitaDAO community sold $VITA and pulled liquidity from exchanges.
There was no hack. There was no rug pull. The VitaDAO multisig has since restored liquidity and volatility is back under control!🚀🚀🚀 Out of this experience, one important lesson has surfaced: always be careful with anyone who contacts you privately to buy your $VITA or other tokens.
Fundraising at its finest via Gitcoin!
VitaDAO collaborated with LifespanIO and Vitalik Buterin to quadratically match funding in the human longevity space. In VDP-13, the DAO voted to donate $64,299 USDC to match longevity research initiatives on Gitcoin. Thank you to everyone who donated!
Listen to Keith Comito and Vitalik Buterin’s thoughts on the longevity research funding round and future of decentralized research:
Note: The relevant segment starts around the 35-min mark
Want to learn more about public goods funding? Listen to a conversation between Gitcoin Co-Founder, Scott Moore, and VitaDAO contributor Lea Degen:
STA-STA-STA-Staking!
$VITA will soon be available on the Bancor Network for individuals to provide liquidity and earn rewards! Stay on the lookout for a VitaDAO medium article outlining how to stake your $VITA token and the intricacies of the process.
Article: Pay-for-Success Models
Savva Kerdemelidis and Ariella Coler-Reilly recently published an article on the new pay-for-success model of conducting drug development. This article compares traditional means of drug development with pay-for-success contracts using unique graphics and a hypothetical scenario involving rapamycin to treat aging.
Article: Public Investment Yield
Check out VitaDAO’s medium to read an article written by VitaDAO Longevity Working Group Steward, Tim Peterson, on ways VitaDAO is improving the yield of existing public investment and enabling democratic participation in longevity projects.
Blockchain for Science
Check out the video below for a recap of December 8th’s Blockchain for Science & VitaDAO MiniCon 2021:
Exercise Your Right to Vote
Among the most exciting aspects of VitaDAO is that anyone holding $VITA can vote on proposals! Here are two notable proposals nearing phase 2 of voting on Discourse:
VDP-11: New 10% VITA Mint for Treasury & Strategic Contributors
This proposal was recently updated for clarification. In layman’s terms, the proposal suggests minting an additional 10% of tokens to be issued to contributors (voted on by the DAO) in exchange for treasury funds and expertise from the selected entities.
Due to the low volume of decentralized exchanges, strategic contributors have reached out to VitaDAO with the inability to purchase desired quantities of $VITA. This proposal would enable five new enthusiastic contributors, who have been voted on by VitaDAO, to apply to 5 whitelisted addresses for a 10% vested fresh VITA mint. Addresses would have a one, two, or five-year vesting period during which their locked tokens could earn APY and the ability to vote.
There is a lengthy discussion surrounding the pros and cons of the proposal on Discourse. If you have an opinion, thoughts, or anything to add to the conversation, engagement is encouraged!
VDP-18: Jonathan An- Towards Reversing Periodontal Disease using Geroscience
Periodontal disease is a chronic oral disease with inflammation of the tissues supporting the teeth. The disease’s greatest underlying risk factor is age, highlighting the importance of studying periodontitis within the lens of geroscience studies.
This proposal involves $250,000.000 funding to support an 8-week mouse-model study that would use small molecule inhibitors of the PI3K/NFkB/mTOR pathway to treat periodontal disease. The study would be composed of 5 drug interventions and rapamycin as a positive control. Many age-related diseases follow a path of low-grade, chronic inflammation without infection. This process is referred to as “inflammaging.”
In evaluating the pathways that target “inflammaging,” this proposal suggests a potential gero-science based treatment of periodontitis and the potential for a positive impact on age-related cognitive decline. Discourse voting has not yet opened, but the full proposal is able to be viewed on the VitaDAO Governance Discourse forum.
Help Build the Future on Longevity Research
Currently, anyone (even people without $VITA tokens!) can vote on phase 1 and phase 2 of proposals taking place on Discord and Discourse! By voting, you are helping the DAO make important decisions and playing a role in directing the future of the DAO.
That being said, if you do hold $VITA, we encourage you to vote in all three phases of voting! The transition to Snapshot will require no gas fees, no staking of tokens, and provide more DAO members with an actionable way to shape the future of the DAO.
VitaDAO In The Wild
If you can get past the paywall, see if you can find VitaDAO mentioned in this Nature article on decentralized science (the paywall is a little ironic, right?): https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03642-9
All this discussion of IP-NFTs, exciting new research proposals, and the developing blockchain technology can be tough to follow. It’s a running joke that 1 month in crypto is like 1 year in traditional tech fields! Check out this deep dive on how VitaDAO addresses current issues in scientific funding and dissemination of novel information.
How to Get Involved
The most streamlined way to get involved is to join the Discord and hop into an orientation “Ask Me Anything” call. You can find links to the Discourse, Discord, and Twitter here: https://linktr.ee/vitadao
Upcoming Events
January 5th at 9 PM CET (Recurring Every Wednesday)- Swing by a VitaDAO onboarding session on Discord with Niklas Rindtorff and Alex Dobrin. Join the VitaDAO Discord Server to learn more about the DAO, how to get involved, and have any lingering questions answered.
January 7th at 4 PM CET (Recurring Every Other Friday)- Once involved, hop onto a call for Working Group Stewards and all Working Group Members. Where? On the VitaDAO Discord Working Group Office — Voice channel.
January 9th at 5–7 PM CET (Recurring Every Subsequent Sunday)- VitaDAO Game Night on @gather_town. Pop by to meet some fellow longevity enthusiasts. Click Here to Join Up on Game Night.
January 27th at 3:30 PM CET- Join a panel discussion with VitaDAO contributor and AI guru Max Unfried discussing the intersection of Longevity and Crypto.
Here’s to living longer, living healthier, and perhaps a holiday season full of grapes 🍇
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