For nearly a decade, Mark Zuckerberg and Dr. Priscilla Chan have pursued an audacious philanthropic mission: to cure, prevent, or manage all disease within their lifetime or their children’s. While once supporting education, immigration reform, and diversity initiatives, the billionaire couple is now channeling most of their resources into Chan Zuckerberg Biohub their pioneering science organization focused on leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to accelerate scientific discovery.

At the heart of this shift lies an ambitious plan to build AI-powered virtual cell models capable of simulating how human cells behave. These models could revolutionize the study of inflammation, immunity, and disease progression. Speaking at the Biohub Imaging Institute in Redwood City, California, Zuckerberg called Biohub “the most impactful thing that we have done” and confirmed it will now serve as the couple’s primary philanthropic focus. The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) also operates three additional Biohub institutes in New York, San Francisco, and Chicago each tackling unique scientific frontiers.

Zuckerberg and Chan have pledged 99% of their lifetime wealth (mostly Meta Platforms stock) toward these goals. Since Biohub’s founding in 2016, they have invested over $4 billion into basic science research, with plans to double that by 2035. The organization’s annual budget is projected at around $1 billion, funding large-scale AI infrastructure for biological research and life science innovation.

However, this strategic refocus hasn’t escaped criticism. Earlier this year, CZI ended its grants for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and immigration reform. The couple insists the transition toward science was gradual and long planned, not politically motivated. “We looked at where we could make the biggest impact,” Zuckerberg explained, emphasizing long-term investments in scientific tools and systems that empower researchers globally. The CZI website has since been streamlined, removing previous DEI statements but reinforcing the group’s new mission to make scientific progress accessible to all.

In a recent blog post, the couple reaffirmed Biohub as their “primary philanthropic effort,” while continuing to maintain other charitable initiatives under the CZI umbrella. This renewed focus coincides with a period of declining federal science funding, amplifying the importance of private support for innovation. Dr. Chan, drawing from her background as a pediatrician, described how her work with children suffering from rare diseases inspired her to pursue AI-driven research capable of uncovering cellular mysteries invisible to traditional medicine.

To strengthen this direction, Biohub has acquired EvolutionaryScale, a renowned AI research lab specializing in large-scale models for biological systems. Its co-founder, Alex Rives, now leads Biohub’s scientific division overseeing experimental biology, data science, and AI. The acquisition solidifies Biohub’s position at the intersection of computational biology and biotechnology, enabling groundbreaking new capabilities.

Ultimately, Biohub’s long-term goal is to create virtual cell systems that allow scientists worldwide to perform experiments digitally, accelerating biomedical research beyond the limits of physical laboratories. These open-source models, akin to the training systems behind large language models, will provide global researchers free access to cutting-edge biological simulations. As Chan reflected, Biohub’s achievements from building the world’s largest single-cell dataset to mapping the human cell atlas underscore their belief that AI is the future of biology, bridging the gap between understanding life and healing it.