MycoDAO

MycoDAO is a BioDAO — a decentralized autonomous organization oriented around biological research — built to open fungal science to a global community of researchers, citizen scientists, laboratory operators, and funders. Founded in July 2024 and built primarily on Solana, the project operates under the premise that scientific progress has been constrained by gatekeepers rather than by any shortage of talent or interest. Its infrastructure combines on-chain governance, tokenized intellectual property, mobile laboratory hardware, a gamified data-collection app, and AI-driven analysis tools to accelerate discovery in mycology and fungal biotechnology.

The Fungal Opportunity

Fungi represent one of the most scientifically underexplored kingdoms on Earth. Estimates suggest roughly 13 million fungal species exist, yet only around 150,000 have been formally identified. The untapped potential spans antibiotic discovery, mycelium-based biomaterials, environmental bioremediation, carbon sequestration, and sustainable agriculture — an opportunity valued at approximately $1.3 trillion across therapeutics, bioplastics, and climate applications. Despite this scope, mycological research has historically been underfunded, siloed within academic institutions, and inaccessible to independent researchers and communities outside wealthy research hubs.

Governance and $MYCO Token

MycoDAO runs governance on Solana through Realms, the on-chain governance infrastructure native to the Solana ecosystem. Token holders submit research funding proposals through an open submission system, which enters a community review phase before formal voting. Approved proposals receive treasury disbursements for implementation. Governance power is proportional to $MYCO holdings. Council members are elected annually by the token-holder community and bring expertise in mycology, environmental science, blockchain governance, or community development.

$MYCO launched on Solana in May 2025 via the Bio Protocol launchpad, with MycoDAO raising $468,000 through the token generation event. The total supply is fixed at 210 million MYCO. Distribution: 30% Community and Research Grants, 22% Fungal Biobank and Data Incentives, 18% Industry Partnerships, 18% Founding Team, 12% Liquidity and Operations. Token utility covers citizen science rewards through the MycoApp, transactions in the fungal compound marketplace, biobank sample storage and retrieval, tissue sample licensing, and IP tokenization.

FungIP: Multi-Chain Intellectual Property

FungIP is MycoDAO's framework for tokenizing fungal intellectual property across three blockchains, each suited to a different layer of the IP lifecycle.

Bitcoin IP-Inscriptions: Fungal DNA sequences, bioactive compound data, and research findings are permanently inscribed onto Bitcoin using ordinals-style cryptographic techniques, creating immutable, timestamped ownership records for foundational discoveries.

Ethereum IP-NFTs: Non-fungible tokens represent legal rights to specific scientific discoveries, linking to datasets, licensing agreements, and commercial applications. The IP-NFT model follows DeSci practices established by organizations such as VitaDAO.

Solana IP-Tokens: Fungible tokens fund specific research projects and provide fractionalized ownership of scientific breakthroughs — whether a novel fungal strain, a bioactive compound, or an engineered biological material. Solana's throughput and low fees make it the practical backbone for active funding rounds, governance participation, and high-frequency micropayment use cases such as data-contribution rewards.

Research Infrastructure and Active Projects

Lab-in-a-Box is a portable, modular laboratory system developed by Mycosoft — the hardware company co-founded by Morgan Rockwell — containing DNA sequencing equipment, sterile cultivation flow hoods, microscopy hardware, automated cultivation chambers, and tissue storage. The initiative aims to bring research-grade capability to field researchers and local communities globally.

Project Oyster is MycoDAO's flagship bioremediation initiative. It involves training pink oyster mushrooms (Pleurotus djamor) for salt tolerance and deploying them to clean heavy metals and pollutants from the Tijuana Estuary, a coastal ecosystem straddling the US-Mexico border. The project serves as a proof-of-concept for fungal bioremediation at scale.

MycoApp / MycoDEX is a gamified mobile application described as a Real-World Fungal Pokedex. Amateur and professional mycologists use it to identify fungi in the field, submit verified observations, and earn $MYCO tokens for validated contributions. This mechanism builds a global, distributed data set from citizen scientists at a scale no single institution could replicate.

MYCO Scholarships allocates $2,000 worth of MYCO tokens annually to approximately 80 mycological societies worldwide, selected by community vote. The program connects the DAO to a network of over 25,000 amateur mycologists across many regions.

Multi-Agent AI System: MycoDAO is building an AI analysis platform on the elizaOS framework for processing fungal genomic sequences and field observation datasets at scale.

BLOCKS Platform: A marketplace combining market intelligence, scientific research access, and bio-funding infrastructure for the broader BioDAO ecosystem.

Additional projects in planning include MushroomGO (expected 2026), Project Lion, and Project Fusarium.

Team and Background

MycoDAO was co-founded by Morgan Rockwell (Founder and Lead Engineer) and Abelardo Rodriguez (Founder and Operations Manager).

Rockwell built early Bitcoin infrastructure — he is credited with inventing the first Bitcoin ATM and contributed to Bitcoin Core development. He also created BitCongress, a blockchain-based voting protocol, and BitSwitch, one of the first BTC-based smart contract systems for IoT devices. He later developed the Fungal Computer Interface and Hypha, a programming language modeled on fungal network architecture. He leads technical development and blockchain integration at MycoDAO.

Rodriguez brings over 20 years of experience in broadcasting and digital marketing, including VP roles at Acrotek and work as a Univision anchor. He manages operations, business development, partnerships, and bilingual community engagement.

MycoDAO's institutional partners span research databases (iNaturalist, FungiDB, MycoBank, ResearchHub), laboratory equipment suppliers (Tecan, ThermoFisher Scientific, Oxford Nanopore Technologies), and professional mycological associations (NAMA, IMA, FUNDIS, Fungi Foundation).

Solana Ecosystem Fit

Solana is MycoDAO's primary chain for token issuance, governance, and day-to-day community operations. The Bio Protocol launchpad — which handled the $MYCO distribution — is building on Solana and Base, placing MycoDAO within a growing DeSci ecosystem forming around Solana infrastructure. Realms provides the governance layer, and Solana's combination of low transaction fees and high throughput makes it practical for the micropayment-heavy use cases involved in data-contribution rewards, marketplace activity, and biobank access.

No third-party security audits of MycoDAO's smart contracts or governance infrastructure have been disclosed in publicly available sources as of the time of writing.