Welcome to The Longevist, an overlay journal spotlighting the most promising longevity studies each quarter through a collaborative and transparent process, leveraging insights from a panel of global experts in the longevity space.
Background
VitaDAO (https://www.vitadao.com/) is a community-owned collective dedicated to funding and advancing early stage longevity science research that can improve peoples' lives. To date, VitaDAO has deployed over 4 million USD to 21 research projects. It primarily aims to incubate and spin-out translational academic research into commercialisable IP through the support of Matrix Bio (https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/vitadao-community-approves-launch-and-financing-of-its-first-biotech-company-301955044.html) led by the world-renowned scientist Prof. Vera Gorbunova.
VitaDAO supports the longevity ecosystem in numerous other ways, from writing articles and hosting journal clubs, to co-funding a longevity prize series (https://www.longevityprize.com/) as well as awarding fellowships to help students and early career stage individuals interested in longevity to get more deeply involved. Earlier this year, VitaDAO launched a brand new preprint overlay journal called The Longevist (https://www.longevist.xyz/).
Why Preprints?
Preprints have revolutionised scientific publishing by enabling researchers to share their discoveries with the world immediately. However, the sheer volume of preprints being published daily result in an overwhelming landscape for those eager to keep up with the cutting edge of science. This is where The Longevist steps in. Our editorial board utilises a combination of preprint nominations from the VitaDAO network, social listening tools and AI, to forge a shortlist of 10 preprints each quarter. We then hand this shortlist over to our stellar team of “Longevist Curators”—comprising a mix of industry and academic experts in the longevity space—who then vote in a battle royale to establish what they think are the most novel and impactful preprints of the quarter. All 10 preprints are then featured in rank order in The Longevist with the top 3 voted papers being awarded “Curators' Choice” status and adorned with their very own AI-human hybrid-created preprint cover art.
What Has Been Featured So Far?
Q1 2023 Curators' Choice
In our inaugural edition, the research topics of the Curators' Choice preprints ranged from gene therapy-mediated partial reprogramming (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.01.04.522507v2), to immunosurveillance of senescent cells (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.01.30.524522v1), and multidimensional proteomics (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.03.09.531951v1).
Q2 2023 Curator's Choice
In the 2nd edition, our top 3 preprints were on bowhead whale longevity (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.05.07.539748v2), effects of anti-diabetic drugs on mortality risks (https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.05.19.23290214v1), and how developmental mitochondrial Complex I activity determines lifespan (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.06.21.545894v1).
How Do I Get Involved?
Nominate a preprint (https://www.longevist.xyz/preprint-nomination) and earn 50 VITA if it makes the editors' shortlist and 200 VITA if it is voted in the top 3 by our team of expert Curators. Find out more about the VITA token at https://www.vitadao.com/vita-token.
Become a curator—we are always on the lookout for new Curators—experts with experience in peer-reviewing scientific manuscripts who have made a significant contribution to the longevity field i.e research, drug discovery, etc. If you would like to nominate yourself or someone else, please get in touch! Curators are currently compensated with 500 VITA per issue they vote on.
Read The Longevist—our journal website can be found at https://www.longevist.xyz/ where we encourage you to sign up to our newsletter to receive all the latest updates, and you can also follow us on X (Twitter) @longevist_xyz
We look forward to welcoming you into The Longevist community!
