Iris.ai, the company that designed an artificial intelligence tool to help researchers find relevant scientific papers, has announced the launch of Project Aiur.

This project aims to build an open, community-governed engine that will allow users to access and contribute to a validated repository of scientific research. It is hoped that Auir could help to democratise access to and extend the reach of scientific knowledge worldwide by disintermediating the industry.

Anita Schjøll Brede, CEO and co-founder of Iris.ai stated: ‘We envision a world where the right scientific knowledge is available at our fingertips, where all research is validated and reproducible, where unbiased scientific information flows freely, and where research already paid for with our tax money is free to us. With Project Aiur, we aim to give ownership of science back to scientists, universities, and the public.’

‘Validation of science is something that has to be an open process - no one company can be an arbiter. With Aiur, we’re setting up a self-sufficient, decentralised ecosystem that will disintermediate the process of validating scientific papers. Everyone who participates in Project Aiur will own the project, can use the tools we build together, and can vote in important decisions’ added Brede.

Project Aiur is enabled by blockchain and utilises the AIUR token. This functional token grants membership, voting rights, and access to the KVE and other tools developed on top of the community’s software. Anyone who contributes to the community through code, training data, and research earns AIUR tokens. The tokens can from the beginning be utilised for Iris.ai’s premium services.

There are a number of problems affecting the scientific community today which are hampering global progress. While there is an abundance of research being conducted and published, this is both costly to access, and difficult to manage. Research professionals are pressured to deliver, publish and review on tight deadlines, creating perverse incentives to exaggerate facts and omit assumptions and constraints. With little to no accountability and reward for authors and reviewers, reproducibility suffers. The company claims that Aiur will bring together researchers, coders, and anyone interested in science into a community-governed ecosystem that works to address the numerous problems damaging the scientific research community.

Participants will collaborate to build a ‘Knowledge Validation Engine’ (KVE) based on artificial intelligence and machine learning technology. The engine, when ready, will allow users to submit a piece of research and have it verified against all other research in the world. Over time, the engine will host a vast collection of research that has been validated.

The AIUR token sale will target raising approximately €10,000,000, with a minimum for completion of 60 per cent and a hard cap of 500 per cent. Iris.ai’s founders will not receive any direct monetary compensation, in cryptocurrency or AIUR tokens. If the minimum is not reached, all ETH will be returned to the original holders. The ICO is due to launch in late May 2018. Of the money raised, 75 per cent will be owned by the community itself.