While stranded in the US as he awaits the decision of the court to the US Department of Justice’s (DOJ) motion, Binance ex-CEO Changpeng Zhao recently expressed his newfound interest in biotech firms. CZ revealed that he has “been reading about biotech, thinking about how to use crypto to accelerate research funding there.” Zhao posted about it on Twitter this Tuesday, garnering positive reactions, especially from the medical field.
Reactions on the Tweet of Changpeng Zhao on Biotech
Etica, an open-source medical research firm, was quick to commend the post of CZ. The company said they are glad “seeing others in the crypto industry, start connecting dots to biotech, research [sic] and DeSci at large.”
It then voiced its commitment to “bringing medical research to the hands of the people.”
According to Ethereum.org, DeSci (decentralized science) is built on the “open science movement” and positions itself as an alternative to the current scientific system. This aims to provide platform for scientists to raise funding as well as share data using Web3.
Etica is a startup proof-of-work blockchain secured and decentralized by a mining community. It looks to host millions of IP-free research projects in the future.
Other users took the opportunity to plug DeSci-related programs like Galeon — an emerging decentralized network for training medical artificial intelligence (AI) leveraging blockchain swarm learning (SL).
It should be noted that other key personalities in the crypto community are also actively supporting the medical research sector, notably Vitalik Buterin. The Ethereum co-founder is one of the key contributors of biotech charity firm Kanro with the goal of addressing COVID-19 and other pandemic issues. Cointelegraph reported a total funding from Buterin exceeding $3.9 million.
Present Status of CZ in the US
Zhao is awaiting sentencing in the US after he pleaded guilty to anti-money laundering offenses he allegedly committed while helming Binance. He is currently on temporary liberty on a $175 million bail bond.
Initially, the former Binance head was permitted by Magistrate Judge Brian Tsuchida to travel back to the UAE after the defense lawyers successfully convinced the court that their client was not a flight risk. However, the US DOJ filed an opposing motion to Seattle District Judge Richard Jones, arguing the lack of assurance of CZ’s return to the US for his sentencing — as the USA and UAE have no existing extradition treaty.
Furthermore, the complainants argued that Zhao holds significant assets in his destination, and his bail is already an “exceptional” case.
As a result, Changpeng Zhao is forced to sit it all out until the DOJ motion is resolved in his favor.