Guest Edition: ARDD 2025 - Big Pharma Discovers Healthy Longevity
Victor Björk is a biomedical scientist and longevity concierge, specialised in ageing biology, precision health, and evidence-based access to cutting-edge diagnostics and therapies.
ARDD is the largest European conference on aging research, and this year offered a broad spectrum of key opinion leaders across multiple fields — academia, industry, pharma, clinicians, and policymakers. What struck home was that the GLP-1 experience (which, of course, began here) is drawing major pharma companies into the anti-aging field.
Some other key (and familiar) take aways
Basic research on aging needs more funding.
There is still no universally accepted set of systems-biology markers that both explain aging and demonstrate that an intervention can lead to positive clinical outcomes.
There remains a strong need for transdisciplinary collaborations.
The organizer, Alex Zhavoronkov, presented a project for a “Longevity City” called TopTown in Shanghai, incorporating clinics and basic research side-by-side.
AI and Precision Medicine
Big pharma companies were present — including Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly — both presenting GLP-1 drugs as pioneering longevity medicine, due to their ability to modulate multiple aspects of disease before it manifests. This momentum may pave the way for other gerotherapeutics to gain approval and public acceptance.
GrimAge appears to be the most predictive epigenetic aging clock available today and is now deployed clinically in Singapore by Dr. Andrea Maier.
AI holds enormous potential to accelerate research, but data is often not available or siloed across academic groups and companies. Deep Origin, for example, predicts drug targets and is openly accessible.
Company Highlights
Omniscope: Diagnostics and personalized immune-system profiling, including T-cell changes in disease and aging.
OneSkin: Developing a senolytic peptide applied topically for cosmetic use.
Agelabs: Conducting a clinical trial on NAD+ in Ataxia-Telangiectasia.
Scientific Highlights — Gerotherapeutics
SGLT2 inhibitors such as dapagliflozin extend lifespan modestly in mice and can prevent multimorbidity in old age.
James Kirkland discussed senolytic clinical trials and regulatory hurdles.
Stem-cell therapies are widely used, but proving that benefits arise from the cells — rather than secondary microenvironment changes — remains a challenge.
Nobel laureate Morten Meldal presented work on Aβ-peptides and preventing fibrillation that damages brain tissue.
Multiple talks focused on autophagy, mitochondrial aging, and proteomics.
International & Policy Highlights
Heike Bischof-Ferrari discussed DO-Health and the Swiss Healthy Longevity Campus, a transdisciplinary collaboration.
Wanviput Sanphasitvong presented on deploying longevity medicine in clinics across Thailand.
McKinsey published a report on healthspan research, highlighting challenges in the field.
Corporate Clinical Development Highlights
Life Biosciences presented data in mice and non-human primates on reprogramming in the eye. They will begin human clinical trials in January 2026 for NAION (non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy) using OSK (Oct4, Sox2, Klf4). Their drug ER-300 also improved a mouse model of MASH, improving ALT/AST, cholesterol, liver weight, and steatosis — making them the first company to conduct clinical trials in cellular reprogramming.
Rejuvenate Bio: Presented new data on RJx-01, a Metformin + Galantamine combination repurposed for sarcopenia.
Retro Biosciences: Shared an update on collaboration with OpenAI on reprogramming factors.
BioAge Labs: Targeting NLRP3 as a “master regulator” of inflammaging — suppressing it improves health and disease outcomes in the elderly.
All in all, ARDD remains a leading festival of anti-aging science!
