Brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease and schizophrenia affect 1 in 6 people worldwide. The annual cost of brain diseases in Finland alone is over €10 billion and globally up to €3 trillion. In addition, over 90% of novel drugs being developed for brain diseases fail during the clinical studies – that is after they have passed all the preclinical study steps. One of the main reasons for the high failure rate is the lack of good preclinical models, since animal models do not correspond well to humans.
To tackle this, we are developing a novel a novel technology, Living Human Brain (LHB). LHB technology enables growing human-derived brain tissue, brain organoids or so-called minibrains, from the cells such as blood or skin cells of any individual. LHB-minibrains provide a next generation brain model with all the relevant cell types of human brain: different types of neurons, microglia, supportive glial cells and vasculature. Thus, this technology will provide a physiologically relevant human minibrains for drug discovery and development. LHB-minibrains are generated utilizing stem cell technologies and thus can replicate the brain physiology of any individual. This opens the possibility to utilize LHB also for personalized medicine.
We are exploring various opportunities to commercialise LHB. We are looking for partners in the pharmaceutical industry for validating our mini-brain technology. In addition, we are looking for investors interested in our technology to finance development efforts and the establishment of the spinout company after the two-year project funding finishes.
Applications of Living Human Brain