As announced by the University of California San Diego (UCSD) on March 7, the post-secondary institution has received a donation of 15 million USD Coin (USDC) from the Balvi Philanthropic Fund. The foundation is currently led by Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin and “is a direct endowment and science investment fund to quickly deploy into high-value COVID projects that traditional institutional or commercial funding sources tend to overlook.”. As reported by UCSD, the donation is the largest donation of its kind to a US university and will be used to establish the Meta-Institute for Airborne Diseases in a Changing Climate, “The Airborne Institute.”
UCSD stated that the newly created institution will focus on the study of airborne diseases such as influenza, tuberculosis and COVID-19. Their ultimate goal is to develop new treatments, vaccines, and diagnostics for these diseases, while improving understanding of how they spread. Buterin stated regarding the development:
“I am pleased to support the creation of this new institute at UC San Diego, which will work to increase our scientific knowledge of airborne disease and share it freely, enabling infrastructure and policy changes that benefit people everywhere. the world”.
Meanwhile, the atmospheric chemist and UCSD professor, commented:
“Working alongside health care experts, […] we will develop state-of-the-art computational tools and measurements to study these problems. A primary goal is to develop a better understanding of the production and sources of airborne bioparticles and how long they remain infectious.”
The institute will be housed in the UC San Diego College of Biological Sciences. Additional research conducted by The Airborne Institute will be published in open access journals, along with other data. Intellectual property developed by The Airborne Institute will also be released into the public domain.
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