a16z begins investing in DeSci with AminoChain, leads $5M seed round

Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has made its first investment in a decentralized science (DeSci) project, backing AminoChain with $5M in a seed funding round.

In 1951, Henrietta Lacks’ cells were taken without her knowledge or consent. Her cells, known now as “HeLa” cells, went on to become one of the most important tools in modern medicine, leading to breakthroughs in healthcare from the polio vaccine to cancer treatments. For 72… pic.twitter.com/01tZme6gLL

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The funding, led by a16z, will support AminoChain’s development of a decentralized biobank and Layer 2 network. The project aims to improve ownership, transparency, and consent in medical data collection, utilizing blockchain technology to allow enterprise medical institutions to share data securely and while maintaining patient privacy.

AminoChain’s platform includes a proprietary software called “Amino Node,” which integrates with medical institutions’ tech stacks. The software ensures that while the data remains under self-custody on institutional servers, it is harmonized into a standardized format for interoperable collaboration. This system allows developers to build patient-centric applications and source data from various institutions.

The project’s first product will be the Specimen Center, a peer-to-peer marketplace for bio-samples, enabling biobanks to provide researchers access to their collections and track biosample provenance across networks. AminoChain previously raised $2M in pre-seed funding, bringing its total capital raised to $7M.

The investment is notable for its impact on decentralized science, a growing movement to make scientific research more open and collaborative by using blockchain. For the crypto industry, it represents another step toward applying decentralized technology to traditionally centralized sectors like healthcare, potentially reshaping medical data sharing and research collaboration.

Decentralized science (DeSci) seeks to reform scientific research by utilizing blockchain, Web3 principles, addressing funding, publishing, and collaborative issues, and integrating NFT-based IP management and decentralized data storage. Key projects like VitaDAO, ResearchHub, Molecule Protocol, and AthenaDAO are leading the DeSci movement, showcasing their roles from funding to data management through blockchain applications.

This article first appeared at Crypto Briefing