Zuckerberg’s Biohub teams with Google, US government in $1.8B push to model human cells with AI

Halis Sunnetci

Mark Zuckerberg-backed Biohub is joining forces with Google, Meta and the US government in a $1.8 billion effort to generate biological data for artificial intelligence models, the institute announced Wednesday.

Biohub said the US Energy Department (DOE) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will join its Virtual Biology Initiative, alongside Google DeepMind, Isomorphic Labs and Meta.

The project seeks to generate and standardize vast amounts of biological data needed to develop predictive models of cells.

Google DeepMind, AI drug discovery company Isomorphic Labs and Meta will collectively invest $300 million in the initiative, while the DOE will contribute more than $500 million over five years for biological measurement, modeling and computing.

The NIH will contribute datasets and other resources developed through more than $500 million in previous federal investment, with Biohub working to standardize the information for…