as of March 7 Announcement The post-secondary institution from the University of California San Diego (UCSD) has received a USD 15 million coin (USDC) donation from the Balvi Philanthropic Fund. The Foundation is currently directed by Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin and is “a scientific investment and direct gifting fund to quickly deploy to high-value COVID projects that are overlooked by traditional institutional or commercial funding sources.” Are.” As reported by UCSD, the donation is the largest gift of its kind to an American university and will be used to establish the Meta-Institute for Airborne Diseases in a Changing Climate, “The Airborne Institute”.
UCSD said the newly established institute will focus on the study of airborne diseases such as influenza, tuberculosis and COVID-19. Its ultimate aim is to develop new treatments, vaccines and diagnostics for these diseases, while improving the understanding of how they spread. Buterin said regarding the development:
“I’m pleased to support the creation of this new institute at UC San Diego, which will work to advance our scientific knowledge about airborne disease and share it freely, to benefit people around the world.” delivery infrastructure and policy changes.”
Meanwhile, atmospheric chemist and professor at UCSD commented:
“Working closely with health care experts, […] We will develop state-of-the-art measurement and computational tools to study these problems. A key 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 School of Biological Sciences. Further research by The Airborne Institute will be published in an open-access journal, along with other data. Intellectual property developed by The Airborne Institute will also be published in the public domain.