What is the Research DAO?

Following a vision towards openness, transparency, and decentralization, the Research DAO was created to fulfill its research objectives. As a Decentralized Autonomous Organization, the Research DAO is independent and makes decisions based on its own mission. In addition to the initial funds provided by the Harmony treasury, the DAO is also funded by its own members to help steer the research directions that will benefit the community. We are also accepting proposals from other institutions that wish to become funding partners of the Research DAO.

Mission

The mission of the Research DAO is to promote and fund theoretical and applied peer-reviewed research of excellent quality in the field of Blockchain Science. Our vision is to establish the field of Blockchain Science as an independent and recognized field in Computer Science, spanning across the areas of Cryptography, Distributed Computing, Security, Programming Languages, Networking, and Information Theory. We are a non-profit DAO whose goal is the betterment of the field as a whole. We are recruiting researchers from a multitude of fields to pursue theoretical and applied research that will have a positive impact on the the blockchain ecosystem.

The primary means by which the DAO aims to promote its goals is by funding:

1. The development of research papers by researchers in the field.
2. The conduction of experiments required for taking measurements and collecting empirical data.
3. The implementation of research directions in code to ascertain their viability.
4. The organization of and participation in conferences in the field of Blockchain Science.

Phase One

As a first step to achieving our mission, we are proud to support the peer-reviewed works of students in the field. An important expense, especially for underfunded universities worldwide, is the travel expense for participating in a conference. Unfortunately, students of traditionally disadvantaged universities often do not have the funds to travel and present their papers, even though their work has been accepted at a top conference.

We are currently offering travel funding for undergraduate, graduate, and PhD students to participate and present their papers in academic conferences.

If you are interested in receiving funding from the Research DAO, consult our page on receiving funding.