Science is the greatest human invention, but increasingly it is a victim of the “attention economy”. Scientists are often tempted to gain eyes for their works by publishing attention-grabbing headlines. The Internet plays an instrumental role in the hype. Untrustworthy websites and social media spread misinformation fast. Scholarly articles and crafted opinions are delivered through search engines. The limited availability of quality data and peer review really impedes scientific progress. This is where open science comes in, as it provides accessible knowledge that can be openly shared and enhanced through collaboration. With quality, integrity, equity, and collective benefit at its core, open science promises to enable transformation. Therapoid is a new Polygon-based blockchain Decentralized Science (DeSci) project that provides an open science environment controlled by the research community. It aims to counter misinformation and promote fundamental and applied research.

About Therapoid

Therapoid.net is a free open science platform that caters to the scientific community and gains recognition and visibility for its members. It helps researchers to collaborate and achieve success. Interdisciplinary communication starts on its message boards, which can award Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) for important thoughts. This is a key aspect of modern science, and the free Therapoid discussion forum enables everyone to participate in conversations.

In addition, the founding members of Therapoid realized that intellectual property (IP), like many other forms of property, often remains unused and becomes worthless to the rights holder. Nobody gains any benefit from this inactivity. For this reason members of Therapoid need to agree and ensure that all content and innovations will remain free and open via a Copyleft and Creative Commons 4.0 ShareAlike licensing model. The strong ethos of open-access publishing is well embodied in Therapoid. The project was launched recently and it received grants from PolygonDAO.

Previously, Therapoid was known as Open Therapeutics, as its founding core was to improve human, animal, plant, and global health. The team comprises notable interdisciplinary scientists and students from various backgrounds. The global software firm, V2Soft Inc. is helping with product development. The project has raised nearly $5 million to date, and its innovative approach has generated a nice buzz.

ScienceCoins Cryptocurrency

Therapoid awards collaborating researchers with a cryptocurrency called ScienceCoins (SCI). A major impediment in collaborative open science is that the participants lack incentives. The institutional embrace of open science also has not happened as quickly as had been hoped. Scientists in economically developing nations face hurdles in completing their research. Often, they can’t afford to subscribe to international journals or travel to seminars and conferences. Exorbitant article processing charges required by some publishers kill many innovations before they can gain traction. ScienceCoins were created to address these issues. All registered users of Therapoid gain the token after a successful registration. Active participation in various activities helps them to earn more awards.

Scientists often spend a lot of time writing a complex grant proposal, only to discover that the proposal was rejected. On Therapoid, a highly-rated, but unfunded grant application can be submitted to the community for ScienceCoins funding.

ScienceCoins will eventually be traded on exchanges. All economic value transfers on the platform are rewarded through the delivery of ScienceCoins. Imagine getting paid for article translation or subscribing to a scientific journal using it. What backs the ScienceCoins value? The “scientific proof of work” is the key. For example, instead of the computer doing the work to generate Bitcoins, the member does the work to generate the award of ScienceCoins. The community recognizes the work, and the award of DOIs is an excellent artifact of the proof of work. You can think of DOIs backing ScienceCoins through a “scientific-proof-of-work” similarly as gold backs fiat. The maximum supply of ScienceCoins is 500,000,000, and it is an ERC20 token. The Therapoid ScienceCoins possibilities are enormous and their use cases can be dynamic.

*Tentative events that will award ScienceCoins – from the Therapoid whitepaper*

Reddit-like Forums & DOI

Therapoid can be considered primarily like an advanced Reddit message board platform. Unlike Reddit, the Forums are very advanced, as they enable the issuance of DOIs for message postings. Let’s understand how it works! A DOI is a persistent identifier used to uniquely identify various objects, standardized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). They are widely used to identify academic information such as journal articles, research papers, data sets, and publications. A DOI is bound to the information object to which it refers. This is achieved by inserting the DOI into the information object’s metadata. On Therapoid, DOIs can be issued to the message posts that have intellectual value by the community for researchers and students around the world. These DOIs can be instrumental for career advancement, IP filings, grant funding, free equipment, inclusion in the knowledge center, preprint server etc., and they are propagated in the Forums through continuous communication. The users must opt-in within their Profiles to see and access various other features.

Therapoid wants to create a safe and inquisitive place for the scientific community. With the advancement of blockchain technology, the idea of a revolutionary open science platform with its own economy looks very appealing. Therapoid’s free IP structure gives broadscale opportunities for use. Once it successfully connects the global science community, multiple revenue streams may be possible.

Imagine the scope for advertising and selling recruiters access to users who have opted in. An active and collaborative member on the platform can also get noticed by the inventors and other organizations, as well as get opportunities to receive free equipment, co-authorship opportunities, peer review participation, funding lines, speaking engagements, employment, consulting etc. Earning ScieneCoins is the cherry on top. SCI can be thought of as the “Bitcoin of Science” that acts as the currency of knowledge. It will not be easy to earn it, as it requires “scientific proof of work”. Keep a close eye on Therapoid. Through it, we may come to see a new perspective on open science.

Therapoid is live on Polygon. Sign up here. Follow Therapoid on Twitter.

This article was first published here.

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An Introduction to Therapoid and the ‘Bitcoin of Science’