Life Biosciences Incorporated

Life Biosciences aims to bring top scientists together from the world’s preeminent research and academic institutions into a discovery, development, and commercialization ecosystem dedicated to advancing treatments for age-related diseases. Founded in 2017 and headquartered in Boston, MA, they are pursuing clinical therapies across multiple molecular pathways that target each of the hallmarks of aging. Their mission is to extend healthy human lifespan significantly.

Reversing optical neuropathy through cellular reprogramming

Epigenetic alterations are one of the reasons we age. Simply put our cells become functionally older and dysfunctional based on the signals from genes they recieve which change over time. It has been shown in a number of experiments that this aged gene expression can be reversed and in doing so, cells and tissues become functionally younger.

Their platform for epigenetic reprogramming changes the epigenetic makeup of older animals to match that of younger animals by activating three Yamanaka factors [OCT4, SOX2, and KLF4 (OSK)]. When their OSK treatment was injected into the eye, it enhanced nerve regeneration after optic nerve injury, restored vision in a glaucoma mouse model, significantly improved vision in aging mice, and showed improvement in visual function and nerve axon survival in a non-human primate (NHP) model of non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION). In mice, no negative effects were observed 15 months after receiving the OSK treatment through the bloodstream.

They are currently developing drug candiate ER-100 for partial cellular reprogramming to treat optic neuropathies such as NAION and Glaucoma.

Boosting Autophagy to combat neurodegenerative conditions

Selphagy was a company Co-founded by Dr. Ana Maria Cuervo and Dr. Evris Gavathiotis, researched ways to restore autophagy, the process by which cells recycle waste products, to older cells. They identified molecules that appear to improve the removal of damaged or misfolded proteins that accumulate with aging and lead to diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, amyloidosis, and other age-related neurodegenerative diseases. These drugs aim to target the autophagy process, helping our bodies clean out the cellular garbage and restore homeostasis and function lost due to aging.

Chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA) is a process where cells break down unwanted proteins. As we age, CMA activity decreases because a key protein called LAMP2A is not expressed as much, causing buildup of insoluble protein clumps that disrupt cell function. They have found new small molecule compounds that can be taken orally and boost the production of various proteins in the CMA pathway, including LAMP2A, leading to increased CMA activity. They claim their CMA activator compounds have proven effective in animal models of frontotemporal dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, and retinal degeneration.

According to an April 2021 press release, Dr. Cuervo’s team has developed a new drug, which raises chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA) by increasing LAMP2A receptors on lysosomes. In a study published in Cell, oral doses given to two different mouse models of Alzheimer’s resulted in improved memory and walking ability with a decrease in depression and anxiety.

Selphagy is now part of Life Biosciences, which owns multiple rejuvenation biotechnology companies, each focusing on a different hallmark of aging.