 Around $26 million in grant funding has just been made available for scientific research that can improve our understanding and control of human aging thanks to donations from supporters such as Vitalik Buterin who is behind this initiative and how can you get in on the action? Find out in this episode of Lifespan News. The grants, known as impetus grants, are specifically designed to have immediate impact. Grants can request up to $500,000 and decisions will be made within three weeks. As with many recent projects and announcements, impetus grants exemplify the increasing crossover between the blockchain and cryptocurrency communities and the longevity community. The founding donor was Juan Benet of Filecoin and he was joined by Mt. Gox creator and stellar co-founder Jed McCaleb. While known longevity funder and cryptocurrency pioneer Vitalik Buterin has also donated around $5 million worth of Ethereum, a cryptocurrency which he helped to create. Impetus grants are a project of the longevity apprenticeship managed by Martin Bork Jensen, the chief scientific officer of Gordian Biotechnology. Gordian claims to have created the first in vivo therapeutic screening platform to radically improve drug development for complex diseases of aging. This style of funding was inspired by COVID-19 fast grants, which were designed to be faster sources of emergency science funding during the pandemic. The first round of those grants were given out within 48 hours, with the review of subsequent applications happening within two weeks. Researchers from any field can request funding as long as their work is relevant to the impetus grants mission. Smaller requests are favored so that more projects can be supported. The reviewers have expressed an interest in betting on scientists willing to challenge assumptions and develop new tools and methodologies, even if their hypothesis isn't strongly supported. The plan is for all intellectual property to remain with the researchers or their university. In an attempt to ensure that knowledge is gained from all studies, a special issue of the peer-reviewed journal JeroScience will publish both positive and negative results. According to Jensen, the work we'll fund is not for the few. It's medicine aimed at treating multiple diseases at once. It's enabling healthcare, rather than relying on sick care, by attacking the drivers of the disease, pain and frailty that afflict everyone. The impetus grants plan to complement large institutions, such as Google-affiliated Calico, and recently announced Jeff Bezos-backed Altos Labs, which you can learn more about in our recent episode of Lifespan News, linked in the video description. Applications are open as of September 13th, 2021, and you can apply on their website at impetusgrants.org. They are also seeking donations to increase the amount of funding they can give out. Likewise, the team at Lifespan.io, which backs the creation of content like this on Lifespan News, also funds scientific research to understand and overcome human aging. To support this research and the creation of content such as this, you can visit Lifespan.io forward slash donate. We are excited about this development as more funding for longevity science is a win for everyone. We look forward to seeing what projects will be funded and what we'll learn from their work. We'll keep you updated as more is announced, so please subscribe to our channel so you don't miss out. This is Ryan O'Shea, and we'll see you next time on Lifespan News.