Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, co-founder and co-CEO of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), share their visionary goal to cure all human diseases by the end of this century.
They discuss their strategy of funding transformative projects and technologies at the intersection of biology, engineering, and artificial intelligence (AI), and the development of Biohubs to boost scientific discoveries.
The Ambitious Goal of CZI
The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) has set an ambitious target to cure, prevent, or manage all diseases by the end of this century.
Leveraging resources and experiences in technology and medicine, the initiative aims to accelerate scientific discoveries and advancements in healthcare.
The Mission of CZI
CZI’s mission is not just about curing diseases but also about changing the way basic scientists see the world and how they can move quickly in their discoveries.
This mission is driven by the belief that if we continue focusing on it, the goal of curing, preventing, or managing all diseases by the end of the century will happen.
The Importance of Tools in Scientific Progress
The CZI recognizes the importance of tools in accelerating scientific progress.
Most large-scale discoveries are preceded by the invention of a new tool or a new way to see something.
Therefore, the CZI aims to bring together scientific and engineering knowledge to build tools that empower the entire field.
The Role of CELLxGENE in Research
CZI has built a tool, CELLxGENE, that allows researchers to input a mutation they’re interested in and see a heat map of which cell types express the gene.
This tool can help generate new hypotheses about the relationships between genes, cell types, and diseases.
It can also help anticipate potential side effects of new therapies.
What we were hoping to do at CZI was think about how do we build a better future for everyone and looking for ways where we can contribute the resources that we have to bring philanthropically and the experiences that Mark and I have had, for me as a physician and educator, for Mark as an engineer, and then our ability to bring teams together to build the builders. – Dr. Priscilla Chan
The Intersection of Biology, Engineering, and AI
CZI is creating a new field by combining biology, engineering, and AI to solve significant health challenges.
This approach, which involves both in silico experiments and human validation, could revolutionize the way biomedical research is conducted.
The Role of Biohubs
Biohubs are a crucial part of CZI’s strategy.
These institutes gather interdisciplinary teams to tackle grand challenges beyond the reach of a single lab.
The first Biohub was launched in San Francisco, in collaboration with Stanford, UC Berkeley, and UCSF.
We don’t think, at CZI, that we’re going to cure, prevent or manage all diseases. The goal is to basically give the scientific community and scientists around the world the tools to accelerate the pace of science. – Mark Zuckerberg
The Importance of Cell Understanding
Understanding the fundamental operations of diseases and cells that span various diseases could lead to the discovery of core principles that could make curing all diseases a reality.
The cell, as the basic unit of life, sits at the center of all disease-related discussions.
The Power of AI in Processing Data
Large language models in AI play a critical role in CZI’s strategy.
These models help process and analyze vast amounts of data, essential given the complexity of human biology.
The goal is to use these models to create a virtual cell, a data-driven representation of a human cell that can be manipulated to accelerate scientific discovery and medical advancements.
The Impact of Single-Cell Methodologies
The application of single-cell methodologies has led to breakthroughs in understanding certain diseases.
For example, applying these methods to lungs led to the discovery of a new cell type affected by the cystic fibrosis mutation, changing our understanding of the disease.
The Role of AI in Hypothesis Generation
AI can assist in interpreting the vast amounts of data generated from single cell sequencing by generating multiple hypotheses from the data.
This approach can accelerate the process of scientific discovery, as traditional methods allow for testing only one hypothesis at a time.
The Development of Non-Profit Life Sciences AI Clusters
CZI is building one of the largest non-profit life sciences AI clusters.
By training a model with all of the Human Cell Atlas Data and other inputs, they aim to simulate all the different types of cells and all the different states they can be in, both healthy and diseased.
This could revolutionize our understanding of human biology and disease.
The Future of Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality
The future of Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), and their potential to transform not just online experiences but every aspect of everyday life were also discussed.
Zuckerberg discusses various Meta platforms, including social media platforms, and their effects on mental health in children and adults.
