Tech giants are funding the launch of a research lab at UC San Diego to unravel the mysteries around blockchain, a new way of writing software that’s sweeping industries around the globe.

The new academic center is called BlockLAB, and it includes about 20 individuals who will be digging into the technical, legal and business questions surrounding the fast-moving new technology. The laboratory is financially backed by tech titans like IBM, Dell and Intel, among others.

Touted by some as a revolutionary concept, blockchain — in its simplest form — is a way to distribute data across lots of servers in a fixed, unhackable format (so far). The concept is alluring to many, as they say it’s a foundational way to exchange information without the help of third parties. For example, one day monetary transactions could be made through software without the help of banks, where one transaction is recorded across hundreds of computers and verified by dozens of servers — instead of just one bank.