Round up: US$12m to accelerate research in longevity, new partnership to accelerate Alzheimer’s drug discovery, and more

Age Tech World explores the latest developments in business in the world of ageing and longevity.

US$12m to accelerate research in longevity

Longevity startup Circulate Health has announced that it raised US$12m in seed funding.

The company’s patented method of therapeutic plasma exchange uses a procedure that separates, removes, and replaces a patient’s plasma to treat inflammation, improve healthspan, and address certain chronic diseases.

Circulate has been studying the benefits of TPE and its ability to improve human healthspan and address the hallmarks of again, while partnering with clinics to deliver TPE across the US.

Circulate was founded based on scientific research from world-renowned geroscientist Eric Verdin, who is a co-founder of Circulate and CEO of the Buck Institute of Research on Aging.

In partnership with the Buck Institute and led by scientific advisor David Furman PhD, Circulate recently published a clinical trial that found TPE combined with intravenous immunoglobin (IVIG) reduced patients’ biological age by an average of 2.6 years, as measured by multi-omics biomarkers.

Alex Morgan of investor Khosla Ventures, said: “We incubated Circulate to explore whether a safe, well-understood therapy like TPE could counter the deleterious effects of ageing, and offer broader health benefits like potentially removing microplastics from the body.

“Early clinical results are promising, and we’re excited to continue backing the team as they work to make TPE more accessible to more people.”

New partnership to accelerate Alzheimer’s drug discovery

Biotech company Enhanced Genomics has announced a strategic partnership with The ALBORADA Drug Discovery Institute at the University of Cambridge.

The partnership is funded by Alzheimer’s Research UK, The ALBORADA Drug Discovery Institute, and will work to develop the next generation of treatments for the diseases that cause dementia.

According to the company, the partnership has already yielded novel drug targets for Alzheimer’s disease, demonstrating the potential of 3D multi-omics to vastly reduce drug-discovery timelines and increase success rates across various disease areas.

Under the partnership agreement, Enhanced utilised its proprietary Promoter Capture Hi-C technology, multi-omic data, and expert knowledge to map long-range chromatin interactions, revealing crucial gene regulatory-mechanisms involved in driving Alzheimer’s disease.

Enhanced Genomics says that this approach identified several novel targets, as well as corroborating targets already reported in the literature, opening new avenues for therapeutic intervention.

£1.8m seed funding to expand therapeutic pipeline using predictive genomics

Genomics and drug discovery company OutSee has announced it has raised £1.8m in seed funding.

The company has confirmed that the funds will support it through the next phase of its growth strategy, with a focus on expanding the Company’s in-house target discovery programme and establishing new strategic partnerships with leading pharma and biotech companies.

Invented by Dr Julian Gough, CEO and founder, OutSee’s proprietary Nomaly technology predicts disease and phenotype ab initio directly from a single genome.

The AI-powered engine uses hypothesis-free, predictive modelling to draw conclusions from the fundamental molecular and cellular biology of the genome, rather than by pattern-matching known genetic associations.

This company says that this ‘genomics first’ approach enables Nomaly to complement existing target discovery pipelines, uncovering underlying biological mechanisms that drive and modulate disease.

Nomaly can be applied to small datasets, or to unlock new, actionable insights from data that has already been analysed, helping to advance therapeutic discovery and development. The technology has been developed for use across a broad range of application areas, with OutSee’s in-house program initially focussed on CNS, rare and metabolic disease.

OutSee has previously received over £500k in precision medicine grants from Innovate UK to support technology extensions and to test their application on dementia case studies.

PointClickCare Pledges US$75,000 to the Senior Living CaRES Fund

Health tech company PointClickCare has announced a three-year philanthropic partnership with the Senior Living CaRES Fund.

The company has stated it will contribute US$25,000 annually, totaling $75,000, to fund educational grants that support professional development for workers in long-term care and retirement communities across Canada.

Founded in 2020, the Senior Living CaRES Fund has provided over US$3m in emergency financial assistance and educational grants to frontline workers. The company says that the fund recognises the vital role senior living professionals play in caring for older adults and is committed to fostering a stronger, more resilient workforce.

Angeline Pleunis, vice president at PointClickCare, said: “At PointClickCare, we believe that investing in people is the most meaningful way to drive lasting impact.

“The individuals working in senior living communities play an essential role in the health and wellbeing of our aging population, and they deserve every opportunity to grow, thrive, and succeed in their careers.

“Our partnership with the Senior Living CaRES Fund reflects our deep commitment to supporting this incredible workforce through education and development.”

FDA Approves expanded indications for GE HealthCare’s Vizamyl PET imaging agent for beta amyloid detection

GE HealthCare has announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved an updated label for its positron emission tomography (PET) imaging agent VizamylTM (flutemetamol F 18 injection) for beta-amyloid detection.

According to the company, the revised label, effective immediately, expands the indications for use, enables quantitative analysis of Vizamyl scans, and removes significant previous limitations such as monitoring patient response to anti-amyloid therapy.

Up to now, amyloid diagnostics such as Vizamyl have been used to provide a visual assessment of amyloid plaque accumulation in the brain.

With quantification now added to the label, clinicians can reach a more objective assessment, using software that enables a calculation of amyloid load, with published research demonstrating that quantification improves diagnostic confidence and consistency among readers.

In addition, with the removal of a limitation of use for monitoring therapy effectiveness, Vizamyl can also now be used to assess whether the level of amyloid plaques has been reduced sufficiently for the therapy to potentially be stopped.

The label update also adds an explicit indication for selection of patients eligible for therapy and removes several previous limitations of use, including for the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease, based on revised criteria from the Alzheimer’s Association, indicating that an abnormal amyloid PET scan is sufficient to establish a diagnosis.

Furthermore, the label now removes a previous limitation on predicting the cognitive decline or progression to dementia, based on evidence linking amyloid-positive scans to a higher risk of progression from the early mild cognitive impairment phase of Alzheimer’s dementia.