NFgenes

All right. Uh, we're live. So GM, GA, GE gang.

Uh, so just to start off here, uh, if you didn't know what DevNTell is, uh, DevNTell is a 30-minute window for members of the DAO to showcase something they're passionate about or have been working on.

This can be an awesome project you've been working on, demonstrating unit testing best practices, automation goodies, smart contracts, how to structure a project, etc.

Basically, if you've got a passion for something, this is your opportunity to share it with the community. So this week, I'm happy to introduce to you, uh, Vinny and Jose, who will be, uh, demonstrating to us their project NFgenes. So take it away, Vinny and josevelez.eth.

Thank you Narb. Uh, thanks guys. First of all, I just want to say thanks for, thanks to everyone who's here, uh, listening to us talk about our project NFgenes. Uh, before we get started, I'm just curious if anybody here currently listening, uh, has some sort of background in science or medicine or anything like that?

I mean, I guess people can write in the, in the developers-voice text channel, or feel free to speak up, that's also cool. So does anyone, is anyone here from a science or medicine background? All right, I'll take that as a no. Uh, does anyone want to take a stab at explaining what a gene is?

It's how we're made up. Just like a very low level. High level, it's how we're made up.

Yeah, cool. Yeah, does anybody have an idea about, um, how many genes there are in the human genome?

Is it, is it in the, is it in the billions? Or trillions? No, it's, it's not. All right, cool, but thanks for, for, for taking a stab at it Orlando.

So, um, first of all real quick just to introduce ourselves, um, I'm Vinny Canger, so I'm there in the middle. Um, we're also made up of, um, the, the core team is made up of Jose who is quite active in Developer DAO so you guys might already know him, um, and Sebastian Hesse, who is a physician and, um, bioinformatician from Munich, Germany. And, um, yeah he's kind of the authority or the doer, the optimist and the man. Because he's kind of the man of the project, he was the brains behind it, it's kind of his, um, his baby. And, uh, he came to josevelez.eth, who's always ready to get stuff, to get, um, things moving and to get stuff done. And, um, I kind of joined the project and, and, and help out.

So just a little background, um, and feel free to stop me if there's, if you guys have trouble hearing me or any questions, anything at all. Um, just feel free to, to, uh, speak up. Um, so first of all, um, as we, as I mentioned, genome, the human genome is our complete set of, of DNA. And, um, recent research has shown that we have over approximately, somewhere a little bit below 25,000 genes they think in the human genome. And, um, like Orlando mentioned, human genes, um, they're kind of like the instructions for, for, um, for humans. They code proteins which, um, can be anything from antibodies to enzymes, hormones. So these are the instructions for coding these things, for building proteins, um, and making them. And, um, what we're focused on is the bioinformatics point of view. So, um, how we can assist in, um, certain things like cancer research and improving our understanding of gene and protein function.

So, our main goal is that we want to mint NFTs for each gene in the human genome. So we're looking at, um, around 20,000 NFTs in total. We won't start with 20,000, we'll start with a much smaller number and I'll, I'll get to that and I'll let Jose explain a little more why we're going to take, um, the, the approach that we are going to take and why we might start with only a few hundred. Um, but our other main goal is to create, um, a dynamic database of the entire human genome. And what I mean by that is, um, what we don't want to be and what we are not is we are not an NFT collectible. Um, we actually see a really, um, a really good potential here to be a pioneer in the DeSci space. And what we mean by DeSci is decentralized science. So we want to actually have these NFTs have real utility and they'll have real use from a research and scientific point of view and also for citizen scientists so to speak. So people who, um, are, uh, just really interested in genomics, the human genome, DNA or want to learn more about it and be a part of it, that's also, um, a possibility. And then this will all be under a DAO governance.

So, a good way to kind of further explain how, um, NFgenes is where the idea comes from is to look at the current problems in, um, human genomic research and bioinformatics. So, here is a screenshot of this, um, one of the, the staple software in bioinformatics in, in human genomic, uh, research. It's called Ingenuity. Um, and I'd like to ask another question. How much do you think that a license for Ingenuity costs? So this software that we're looking at now that shows an interaction of the human genome and interactions between different genes in the human genome, how much do you think it would cost an institution per year, per user to, uh, to have access to this database and to this software?

Maybe like a thousand or something? Per user.

So you think a, yeah, thousand per user per year? Yeah I mean, that's a pretty good guess. Like, we're talking about maybe research organizations, universities, things like that. So, I would have probably guessed the same, but, um, Sebastian told us that it is $12,000 per year per user to have access to. So this is something that when Sebastian explained it to me, it really opened my, uh, opened my, opened me up to why this idea is actually a possibility.

Um, so the problems that this will solve, that NFgenes is trying to solve is that we, um, current bioinformatics and human genomics, uh, research is dealing with an oligopoly. We, there are only two, um, good software providers, Sebastian says. Um, and they're extremely expensive. Um, the other problem is that information is not standardized. So, names for the genes can change depending on, um, which standardization they're choosing to use or what, um, scientific article you might be referencing and so forth. Um, another one is they sometimes, they, they don't tend to be as up-to-date as they could be. So Sebastian, he deals a lot with the problem that he has to look through five to 10 of the most recent papers in order to get the most up-to-date research even though he has access to this $12,000 a year software. Um, the other thing Sebastian complains about and other, other, um, people in his field, um, often complain about is the access to the software is quite bad. It's ugly and, uh, it's got a limited UX design that doesn't really allow you to, to work with the data very well.

Um, so does everyone follow me so far? Are there any questions? Okay, so our solution approach is that, um, for each gene each gene has a corresponding NFT. And each NFGene holder will get paid each time a scientist queries the database for that corresponding gene. So think about it. You are a holder of this gene, this NFGene, every time they want to look up information about protein interactions for this gene, any kind of information, um, about the gene itself, uh, the holder will receive a small contribution bounty. So, we're imagining something on, um, Polygon where the fees are low and that, um, paying out a small fee for each query would be feasible. Um, the other thing is this incentivizes the holders of those NFTs to keep the information up-to-date because you're receiving money every time someone, you're receiving some, some, a payout, um, every time this gene is queried, and, um, therefore it's in your best interest to, um, keep the information up-to-date, standardized, valid, etc.

So, any questions on that before we go into the finer details?

I guess on the, the, the economics of it, uh, would the, the fees kind of, um, be applied at a, uh, client level or are you going to enforce that at like the smart contract level?

Um, josevelez.eth, could you answer that question perhaps? That's a good question, Narb. Actually we, we really haven't even gotten that far. We're all, we're still very much in the conceptual phase right now. Um, so yeah that's, that's definitely a really good question, uh, that we haven't even, um, we haven't even talked about yet. Yeah, yeah, no worries man. Yeah, yeah, all good, all good.

Yeah, thanks Narb. Any other questions? Okay, yeah, I just want, the reason I'm asking is I want to make sure it's understandable that the go, the, the problems that exist and the goals that we have make sense to everybody. Um, because, uh, as well I don't come from, from a genomics background, this stuff was all new to me when I first spoke with, uh, Sebastian and josevelez.eth about it. So, um, feel free to ask any questions.

Okay, so to continue, we've designed a roadmap and there are four phases to this roadmap. As, um, Jose just mentioned, we're in phase one. So, um, Sebastian has created the, initial dataset of these around 22,000 genes I believe. And, um, uh, josevelez.eth has been working pretty hard on developing a genesis mint contract and we've kind of worked out some initial kinks with that. Um, and from there we would like to start, um, applying for grants perhaps, maybe some small ones to get some, uh, support. And, um, the next point here, identifying labs, researchers and foundations for NFGene airdrops. There's an interesting concept that, um, Sebastian and Jose, uh, brought up where like I mentioned before, instead of minting all 20,000 genes in the beginning, we, um, well Sebastian has identified I think, correct me if I'm wrong Jose, it's about a 100 or 200 genes?

Yeah, I don't, I don't remember the exact number, but yeah, the idea being that there are going to be some of these genes that will be, uh, should would be expected to be quite valuable. And so the idea is that we want to get those in the hands of, uh, specific, um, labs or researchers or foundations, uh, to get them in the inside this community, but also you know put them, put those valuable NFTs in the right hands. Yeah, exactly.

So that's the approach that we want to initially take and and that's been dealt with already, like those genes have already been identified. Um, phase two would be further developing an attractive UI to interact with the data. Um, there are lots of good examples and on our Discord we've got links to different, um, prototypes and different ideas and, um, we would like to use perhaps something like D3.js, um, for visualizing the, gene data in a, in a better way, in a, in a more, uh, attractive way. Um, then phase three would be building up the DAO. Excuse me? Okay, I'll continue. Um, yeah, phase three would be building up the DAO for community governance. As I mentioned, um, we've already got, um, the Discord set up with lots of further information, so if you're interested, um, you can go ahead there and, and get more information on all the stuff I'm, I'm mentioning. Um, and phase four would be further developing, um, the image, the brand of NFgenes, even though that's not a great term, but perhaps collaboration, collaborating with artists, um, to really make the, the NFTs themselves and the, the visualization of the genes and the proteins, um, and the, uh, really nice and, um, on top of that promote education and awareness. Because we would definitely have some onboarding to do with, um, these research institutions. So, uh, for example, they might have never heard of, of Web3, of a wallet, of a crypto wallet, of these sorts of things, what's an NFT, how do they interact with it, why it's necessary. We're actually prepared to, um, educate the institutions that we, we would airdrop these initial NFTs to.

Um, so just a little more information about the NFTs themselves and about the genes themselves is that, um, here you see the mainframe, this would be kind of like our idea for the initial genesis mint, would just be a very simple, um, text-based, image of the name, the gene symbol, the name, the ID, the length and the localization on, on the chromosome. It's not necessary to understand all this stuff, but what is necessary, what is good to know is that each NFT will be linked to, um, will have relations to other different databases, as you can see like spiraled around here, that, um, so it's relation, it's linked to other proteins or the proteins it creates, um, certain mutations and and other information, like even the different ID names and synonyms that other institutions use.

For example, Sebastian mentioned like just to have a database where all the different standardizations and different names are used for, for each gene would be huge. He said because you look in one database or you use one resource and they might use one name, you use in another look in another they use a different one, and this is a huge headache for them. So even that would on its own would make this a great resource for cancer researchers for example. Um, Jose is there anything else you'd want to mention about this before I continue? Um, yeah, so just thinking about this, so we, we want to, yeah we want to, like Vinny said, we want to start with this main frame. It's going to be very basic, it's going to be like a text-based like SVG. Um, and then of course we having, as far as how we handle the other data that relates to it, like these IDs and DNAs and RNAs is we, we've talked about some like, um, having additional NFT collections that consist of that data and somehow finding a way to keep all these relationships in place so that when you're looking at a specific gene NFGene, you can kind of navigate around to other collections to see this data. So we, we actually, we, we, we were thinking about is that there's two ways to access there will be two ways to access this information. The first way is just by navigating through the NFT collections themselves, which is free, public, anybody can do it. Um, it's not going to be very wieldy for researchers and that's why we want in phase two to do to develop a more advanced UI so that these researchers, these power users that really need to harvest data and go through and and use this data for research, they have a, a, a much more robust way to do that. So, um, yeah that's, that's, um, yeah that's, um, what we're trying to work on.

Cool. All right, um, yeah I think actually this would be a good, um, time for me to hand it off to you josevelez.eth so you can explain more about the DAO, right?

Yeah. Um, I'll, I'll just use since you've got it up. Sure. So, um, I think one, one of the things that we think is pretty important for this project is the DAO, um, because of kind of how it sits in between everything. Um, so, um, the DAO is going to be the community of NFGene holders, so anyone that's got one of these, uh, NFgenes, um, will have, uh, governance rights, uh, to that. We haven't gotten down to the specifics on how to implement that, um, it's just, that's, that's what our aim is that each holder will be a member of this community and have governance rights. Um, the DAO will accrue fees from project royalties and some of, some of those, uh, will be, uh, from the from the NFT sales themselves out on the open market. Uh, I think pretty standard where you'll see like, an NFT when it transfers, when it trades on an open market, there might be a royalty that kicks back to the, project owner. So something like that, and then also, um, the fees generated from the actual search tool that we want to build. So I think that's what we expect to be the main source of revenue is by just, um, offering that search tool to researchers and then paying a very, very small fee. Um, the one example I can think of, I don't know if how many folks have ever had to do this, but, if you're in the US and you need some information from, a for a business or something, you may have had to go to the Secretary of State website and they have this really ugly website and you go to it like, okay I need to know this business, this address or something like that. And you go over there and you pay like 50 cents or a dollar just for the just to run that query and then it's going to give you a list of results. So something very simple like that where we want, it's going to be a very small fee that when they when they run their query, they pay that. Um, and so, um, that was one way that's the main way we expect to, um, generate some funds for the DAO. Um, and also we will apply for grants as well. Um, decentralized peer review is going to be important as well because we want to decentralize the way this data is, uh, put together and reviewed. So, um, we want each NFGene holder to have the ability, um, you don't have to be a scientist, you don't have to be, um, an expert in this. Um, if you have an NFGene then you have the ability to contribute to the data source. Of course, the DAO will have the ability to review that data and discuss it and then make changes if necessary. We, we talked a lot about this because we we want to keep it open, um, for folks to make contributions, um, and then the DAO wants to provide bounties for those contributions, but we also want to make sure that we can control the quality of the data as well. So that's where the, the sort of decentralized peer review process comes in. And we, we realized that we don't necessarily want to do a snapshot review every time somebody makes a contribution, so it's probably easier for people to make contributions and then, um, folks within the DAO can challenge that update, to say that does not look right or thing like that and then if a challenge happens then we can go through a different process and use a snapshot to modify an update.

Um, funding for underserved research areas. This is something that, uh, we really excited about because, um, this is where, this may help you kind of understand how the value for an NFGene is sort of, uh, calculated. Um, if you can, if you can expect, uh, for example genes that are related to cancer research, they may be the most researched genes in this database, which means that they those specific genes may be the ones that end up, uh, generating the most fees, search fees. And so what the DAO would do was, uh, in the fees that they generate from those specific ones, they would, um, they would, uh, take some of those fees and then use that to fund other areas where there may be some other genes that are lacking funding, um, that, uh, could use some help. So we want to boost those other areas, uh, to, to increase funding from the some of those other areas. And then like I mentioned before is the, the bounties that will go to the NFGene holders that make contributions to the database. So the DAO I think is, is something that we think is really important, uh, to for this community to provide the right incentives all around.

Cool. All right, um, yeah I think actually this would be a good, um, time for me to hand it off to you josevelez.eth so you can explain more about the DAO, right?

Should I go to the GitHub real quick? Yeah, yeah. Uh, you guys can see the GitHub now, right? Yes. Cool. Yeah, we've tried to add a lot of information to the GitHub. Um, we've got an overview repo that just basically tries to cover over a lot of the stuff that we've mentioned here, uh, it's got our roadmap, uh, talks about the genesis mint, the different phases. And then this ecosystem is a sort of like, uh, graphic of the interactions that that I was explaining.

So in the middle you've got the NFGene DAO and then you've got the genesis mint holders or the gene the NFGene holders and then on the outside you have all these different types of interactions. So, um, one interaction could be, uh, external grants that that come to the DAO to help, uh, help the DAO with its mission. Um, some others include, uh, the Web3 front-end application where researchers are using it and, uh, during their research and then they're paying fees that go to the DAO. Um, and then the DAO on the right you'll see that there's some interactions where you've got NFGene holders that are updating, uh, the data. So they could be documenting a new protein interaction or a new mutation or adding a new RNA isoform, all these are different ways that basically folks within the DAO to contribute to the data set. And the the important thing to note here is that if I for example own let's say hacks one gene, um, I I'm not limited to updating only the information for that gene. I can go update information for any other gene that exists and I will still get that bounty. So the idea is that we we want to incentivize, uh, collaboration and and, uh, and folks making contributions to the dataset because everybody, uh, benefits over in the long run. And then on the left, um, we've got different types of interactions where, uh, this is like the last phase phase four where we want to work with artists to, uh, create collaborations with artists. Um, the idea being that we can find a lot of visual talent that can help us with, uh, finding new ways to educate and promote awareness on of of the gene the human genome and all the related data that surrounds it. To kind of, you know not make it look so abstract to folks. And so we want to we want to leverage that talent and, uh, we want to incentivize them. So we're thinking in something along the lines of like NFT collections where there may be some royalties where they collect some of that royalties but the DAO gets some as well, there's a split, um, and then, uh, that allows us to kind of, um, fund the ability, uh, to, uh, to create more, uh, educational tools for the project. Yeah I mean in the end it's an NFT we want it to look cool. Not only be not only be educational. I mean but yeah, so.

Um, another I guess I just want to mention real quick is that like like, um, Jose said, we've got a bunch of stuff on here. Um, Jose created this really cool Merkle tree generator. I mean this is all open source stuff too so you can um, the Merkle tree generator, uh, validates, uh, that the, gene being minted actually exists in our list of genes and it hasn't been minted already. So this is using some really cool, um, techniques with Merkle trees. We've got a a WebSockets event API that we're messing around with to to send out events when things are perhaps changed, um, on in the database and stuff like that. But, um, as you can see we've got a lot planned, we're working on things, but it's it's the early days and, um, we would love help and so if you're interested, um, let's learn and build together. It's a crazy topic, it's, a lot to take in I know, um, neither Jose nor I are genomics specialists. We've got a couple we've got Sebastian and his bioinformaticians on our side that are leading us through this as well, but we're looking for help from anyone. Developers of all experience levels, designers, scientists, artists, even educators, that's super important. So I mean if you find this interesting, um, if you think there's potential in it like we do, then join the Discord, um, come talk to us and, um, yeah pitch us ideas, things that you think you could help with whatever. Um, that is why we came here to DevNTell today. So with that if there are any questions, please go ahead.

Before, um, yeah. Yeah, I was just going to say that this is, this is fantastic. This is an awesome initiative. I'm so, so, so happy you two shared this with us today. Uh, with with regards to, uh, getting involved. Um, like you said there, it does seem to be quite, the environment seems to be quite chaotic. Um, what would be the best place for for somebody to kind of dive right in? Would it be to just, uh, start up a chat in the Discord or are there any open issues in any of the repos?

Yeah, um, uh, Discord, um, Sebastian did a great job of creating channels that kind of you can you can kind of choose your own adventure in our Discord. So there's a welcome and, um, welcome channel, uh, a read first a welcome channel, a missions channel. Basically everything I explained in the presentation in is is on there in greater depth. So go there first um, and and and start chatting. Read and then start chatting. What would you say Jose? Anything else you'd want to add to that?

Yeah, I would emphasize that, um, don't be, uh, don't don't let the subject or the or the, um, intimidate you, um, because it was new to us as well and it's very much exploratory for all of us. Um, we're all kind of feeling our way around this. If you even if you just go look at the repo you'll notice that there's just there it there is a lot going on, um, and that's because we're we're we're exploring things. Um, we've never done this before and we're trying different things and sometimes it'll work and sometimes it doesn't. So you'll kind of see that happening in the repo where we're going to where we may start spin up a repo for something, it may continue or we may just archive it, but you know we're we're we're feeling our way around, we're exploring. And so we anybody that wants to come explore with us and and and try some things out, uh, feel free to hop into our Discord, um, and then we can figure this out together.

Yeah that's a great point. I I want to just add that, um, through different like kind of ideas that we have, for example Jose might go down the rabbit hole of Merkle trees, um, I've learned so much from from the things that he's exploring. Super cool. So, um, we're going to get something out of this no matter what and and also it looks very ambitious because it is, but we're going to take it one step at a time like I mentioned, um, Sebastian said if we can just get an easy to access, um, database where there's standard where there's the information for all the different gene names all the different standardizations are there in one place, he said that would solve a huge huge problem for bioinformaticians just right there. So, um, even if we, uh, don't make it to collaborating with artists and blah blah blah we'll still have an impact by just creating by just this simple approach. So I think that's really, um, motivating and, um, and yeah I think there's some really, um, cool problems to be solved here, so that's why I find it interesting.

Most definitely, most definitely. This is awesome. Uh, we have a few minutes left, uh, does anybody have any, uh, questions for Vinny and josevelez.eth? Echoing what you said Narb, I think this is amazing. Um, I think it's brilliant and I think you guys, uh, got so far with this already. I think it's got potential to be to be really, really long-living and impactful project, so super good job. Um, is there any way that the the Developer DAO can directly support? Um, I don't know what that might look like. Support and helping getting grant funding, support on maybe funneling contributions to the project like anything really.

Yeah, I think you just answered your own question. Um, we'd be I think I don't know I don't want to speak for for all of us but just I'm we're open to whatever whatever assistance we can get at the moment. What do you say Jose? Yeah, um, I think just by us having this DevNTell here and being able to present to everyone in here and having access to all these amazing people within the DAO, um, I'm excited about, um, leveraging some of the talent that's in this DAO to to help us kind of move forward. We're again we're exploring this is this is we're all we're this is we're want to have fun and want to explore this out and and learn new things and, uh, I just lost my train of thought there I'm sorry. Um, but yeah, so you know we're just we're looking for help from a lot of different areas and so, uh, I think that's what I was going to say is your there's a reason why we don't have a timeline on our roadmap is because you know we're taking this slowly, we're not in any rush. Um, there's no timeline, we'll get there at some point.

Yeah, have you guys heard about Nebula, uh, and George George NFT with these G NFTs? Because it seems like there are they're not open source, they're like a, uh, Silicon Valley startup that was acquired. Um, but it would be interesting I'm you know like I dabble a little bit into the biotech space as well, um, as software engineering and stuff and like it I think it got a little bit of backlash from the scientific community and it would be really good to also reward a lot of scientists um, and bioinformaticians from their perspective to see what could be done in an open source environment because when we talk about genetic data, um, there's a lot of information that we can have and if it's open source, it could security is really important because of, um, the data that pharmaceutical companies could drain from an open source project like this, right? So having the security in mind I think it would be really, really key for something as sensitive as genomic data. Um, we basically are exposed, uh, there we're not only genes, right? That that's just what makes us unique, but it's really important I think that's why it got a little bit of backlash last year when, um, George Church wanted to do his own NFTs.

So this project in particular, we're not going to be dealing directly with actual genetic data, um, that's not our goal at all. We we we're focusing mostly on the gene research itself, not not actual genetic data, so we won't be dealing with or storing any genetic data. This is just pure research on the human genome itself and DNA, protein interactions, that that kind of stuff. Okay, yeah we're also not looking to to sequence anyone's genome and make make it an NFT in that sense. This is like I was saying that's exactly what we don't want to be we we want to separate ourselves from there are a few genomics NFT projects out there, but they tend to go more in that direction. So yeah, good that you bring that up because we're we're steering kind of in the other direction away from that. Yeah that's good that's good. Okay awesome. Thanks Angie.

All right. Um, any last questions here? Um, going once, going twice, sold, yes indeed. All right once again thank you so so much Vinny and Jose for sharing this awesome project. Uh, yeah um I'm sure all of us are dying to see where it goes myself especially this is really cool. I'll be keeping tabs for sure and if I have the bandwidth I'll see if I can help out as well. Um, but with that uh to close out, so there will be a um just like every other week I'll post a link to a Google sheets where you can claim the POAP for this the for today's session and Vinny and Jose I will send you your speaker POAPs in through DM and with that I wish everybody a great weekend and Web3 con is upon us, so next Friday's DevNTell will be a quote-unquote special edition uh where we have our friends from The Graph protocol demoing us some new goodies from their end. Um, so with that uh I will say happy Friday to everybody or Saturday, depending where you are. All right and with that I will stop the recording.

For sure, for sure. Thanks everybody. Thanks Narb. Thanks Vinny, thanks Jose.