Author: Alexander Layendecker, PhD

Date: 15 September 2025

Abstract#

A high-impact scientific experiment (NASA’s Rodent Research-20/RR-20) flown aboard the ISS in 2023 was recently defunded due to NASA budget cuts. The data from this experiment - and more importantly the future data that could be collected from the subject mice colony - is exceptionally valuable to humanity’s future settlement of space, due to its unique focus on mammalian reproductive systems and long-term genetic impacts of spaceflight. MoonDAO member organization Advanced SpaceLife Research Institute (ASRI) has been developing a crowd-raise funding campaign in cooperation with MoonDAO to raise a target equivalent amount of $1.5M USD, which would extend/fund the RR-20 experiment for an additional three years at University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC). Additionally, MoonDAO intends to use ASRI’s RR-20 crowd-raise campaign as a flagship project for its newly upgraded platform, but both ASRI and MoonDAO require additional time to adequately prepare for the official launch. This proposal is for the MoonDAO community to fund Rodent Research-20’s mice colony for a period of three months (90 days) in order to buy the mice time while campaign preparation efforts are completed.

Problem#

The KUMC research team’s remaining grant funding for RR-20 will run out by the end of September, which will unfortunately result in euthanization of the mice colony, and the total loss of any future data that could be gained from studying them. ASRI and MoonDAO still need time to sufficiently prepare and lay the groundwork for the crowdfunding campaign to ensure the highest probability for success.

Solution#

Allocate funds through the MoonDAO community to cover costs of sustaining the RR-20 colony for a period of 3 months (90 days), in order to keep the mice alive while the remainder of the ASRI-MoonDAO crowd-raise campaign is built out, to ensure the highest chances of successfully raising the full target amount (saving the mice for an additional 3 years).

Benefits#

With a high probability that a successful crowd-raise campaign to save the mice in November could go viral (due to the subject matter, reproduction in space/animal welfare), MoonDAO’s involvement/contribution could greatly increase its global recognition footprint/public profile. This could potentially result in a significant increase in website traffic, as well as additional individuals from around the world joining the MoonDAO community, driving an overall increase in revenue. A successful campaign to save the mice would also likely generate a large amount of international goodwill for MoonDAO among both the general public and animal advocacy organizations.

From a scientific standpoint, the overall impact that the data gained from RR-20 could have in the fields of space research, reproductive medicine, and genetics is assessed to be massive - with significant potential to not only increase the base of medical knowledge which will ultimately enable sustained human settlement in space, but also significantly improve human health metrics and practices here on Earth.

Risks#

In the event that the eventual crowd-raise campaign (planned for November) fails completely, the mice would be scheduled for euthanization, not only resulting in the loss of life and extremely valuable science, but could potentially negatively impact both ASRI and MoonDAO’s public images.

Objectives#

Objective #1: Allocate and transfer funds to the RR-20 project to extend the lifetime of mice for a period of 3 months, until the ASRI-MoonDAO joint crowd-raise campaign can be launched in November 2025.

• Equivalent amount of $15,000 successfully allocated to the project, and subsequently transferred to KU Endowment Fund for application to KUMC research team’s efforts.
• RR-20 mice colony lifetime extended until mid-November 2025.
• Crowd-raise campaign for $1.5M officially launched NLT 15 November 2025.

Member(s) responsible for OKR and their role:

• Dr. Alexander Layendecker (Project Proposer & ASRI Director)
• Dr. Lane Christenson (RR-20 Principal Investigator/Research Team Lead)

Team (Table A)#

Timeline (Table B)#

Deadline for the project: 30 September 2025.

Transactions (Table C)#

Please write out the specific transactions that need to be executed if this proposal passes. Please include the exact amount and token type and the receiving address (this is the multi-sig if there is more than one transaction that needs to be executed throughout the lifetime of this project.)