Turn Biotechnologies: Developing mRNA medicines to induce healing by instructing specific cells to fight disease or repair damaged tissue

Turn Biotechnologies creates therapies that rejuvenate cells and tissues, as well as technology to precisely deliver those therapies. The company’s mRNA-based ERA^™ (Epigenetic Reprogramming of Aging) technology is a platform that rejuvenates cells by targeting their epigenomes to restore cell function. It can be used to treat virtually all tissues throughout the body. Turn Bio is currently developing indications in multiple therapeutic areas, including dermatology, osteo-arthritis, immunology, ophthalmology, and musculature. Medicine currently cannot treat age-related conditions in these areas that afflict hundreds of millions of people around the world.

Turn Biotechnologies has also developed eTurna^™, a platform that overcomes the biggest challenge to cell therapy researchers worldwide: Delivering therapies precisely to targeted cells. eTurna can safely and effectively deliver a variety of cargoes – including those produced by other companies. This nanostructure carrier overcomes the problems of traditional lipid carriers, including instability, poor bioavailability, poor solubility, and poor absorption. It can also be adapted for individual therapies and tuned for use through different routes of administration.

In conversation with CEO Anja Krammer and Co-Founder Vittorio Sebastiano

Q. What was the motivation behind starting Turn Biotechnologies?

Turn Biotechnologies was founded to develop cures for age-related diseases that are currently untreatable. The problem – which we call a “silver tsunami” – is already serious and worsening as the population here and around the world ages. In the United States, nearly 20% of GDP is spent on medical care, about $4 trillion. Ninety percent of the nation’s annual healthcare spending goes to treat patients with chronic and mental health conditions, which includes age-related conditions. Seniors accounted for 56% of U.S. health spending in 2019, though they made up just 30% of the population. Per person personal health care spending for the 65 and older population was over $19,000, more than 5 times higher than spending per child ($3,749) and almost 3 times the spending per working-age person ($7,153).

We believe this looming societal and healthcare problem can be managed by resolving disease at its root: the cell. We are not focused on keeping human beings young and immortal. We are committed to turning back the clock on aging at the tissue level to prevent aging-associated conditions from appearing within the tissues and the organs that may be affected. The technology to rejuvenate cells was invented in a university lab. Turn Biotechnologies was founded to expand on that research to develop actual therapies. Our mission is to build a bridge from academia, where we imagine the possibilities, to the real world, where our imaginings are applied to improve the quality of life for people. Our long-term goal is to revolutionize medicine for the diseases of aging, to democratize it, making it affordable, and improve the life quality of life for elderly individuals.

Q. What are the challenges you had to face while developing solutions for Turn Biotechnologies? How did you overcome them?

The single biggest challenge was a technological problem. We had to control the process of maintaining cellular identity. That was monumental. Researchers use Yamanaka factors to rewind the aging clock of adult cells. These factors are proteins expressed in cells, which also regulate the expression of other nuclear genes. Typically, researchers have not been able to control the expression. If Yamanaka factors are overexpressed, they cause pluripotency in cells, which effectively eliminates the defining properties that distinguish, say, a skin cell from a heart tissue cell. We were the first to limit cells’ exposure to Yamanaka factors, which means we rejuvenated cells without inducing pluripotency. The cells we treat with our mRNA-based ERA platform therapies maintained their defining properties and could perform their functions as they would when they were more youthful and vigorous.

We were also the first company to prove the effectiveness of epigenetic reprogramming in rejuvenating human cells.

In addition, we have overcome the problems of delivery. A great challenge to cell therapy researchers worldwide is delivering therapies precisely to targeted cells. The challenge results from two issues: 1) It is difficult to reach targeted cells with rejuvenation therapies, and 2) It is difficult to penetrate cell walls with precise therapies. We developed eTurna to overcome these barriers. We can tune eTurna to precisely target specific types of cells, ensuring that therapies reach the tissue needing rejuvenation. The nanostructure carrier is formulated to ensure the encapsulated cargo passes through cell walls to reach the epigenome.

Q. Can you tell us in brief about your proprietary ERA^™ Platform and mRNA medicines?

The ERA^™ Platform uses mRNA to deliver transcription factors to the epigenome, which are the chemical compounds that tell cells what to do. Our ERA cargo effectively delivers the chemical instructions that rejuvenate specific cells, restoring their more youthful potency. Some companies are focused on gene-editing or DNA-based therapies, which are potentially far more dangerous than ERA because such approaches have been found to increase the risk of cancer.

ERA is safe, fast, efficient, and tunable because it uses mRNA to deliver transcription factors to the epigenome. The platform enables us to carefully control the time, duration, and dosage of transcription factors to optimize the mRNA cocktail for each indication. We control cellular reprogramming by carefully pulsing the cell with transcription factors. Each pulse drives the epigenome to a more vigorous state while protecting the patient and steadily restoring more youthful cell functionality.

Q. What are the factors that affect the pricing of your medicines?

We believe our therapies will dramatically reduce the cost of medical care by:

Curing untreatable diseases: Our mRNA-based ERA therapies will cure age-related conditions that doctors cannot treat. These conditions afflict hundreds of millions of people around the world and treatments to ameliorate their symptoms cost trillions of dollars each year. Those are the costs of helping patients manage their pain, correct their vision, and reduce other discomforts. But remember, these costs do not pay for treatment of the underlying disease because no such therapies exist today.

Making therapies more effective: Our research has demonstrated that using ERA to treat CAR T-cells increases their cancer-killing power by overcoming cell exhaustion and increasing their proliferation. This means patients will require fewer applications (or doses) to treat cancer effectively and the use of ERA during the CAR T-cell manufacturing process means each dose will be more potent. In effect reducing the price per dose fivefold or more.

Improving access to medicine: The barrier to widespread market access has been primarily the increased cost of modern medicines. Our ERA mRNA technology can decrease the cost of manufacturing certain types of medicine, such as CAR T-cell therapy. Also, by addressing the root cause of chronic disease, it will eliminate the chronic use of symptom-treating medicines. This will dramatically reduce the spiraling cost of treating patients who suffer from age-related diseases.

Q. What does the future hold for your company and its customers? Are exciting things on the way?

We believe that we are just at the beginning of an exciting new medical frontier and optimistic about the future. We realize that our mission is not easy, but feel confident that our team, community, and the dedicated individuals who support our mission will make great things happen in the coming years. Short-term, we want people to understand the breakthrough success our technology has had in a preclinical setting and share our excitement for the promise it offers to produce cures for many age-related conditions that are currently untreatable. In coming months, we look forward to getting our therapies into the clinic, where we expect they will prove to be ground-breaking for patients.

Our long-term goal is to revolutionize medicine for the diseases of aging, to democratize it, making it affordable and impactful for the life quality of elderly individuals. Our goal is not to extend the lifespan of people and reach immortality, we are leaving that to some of our competitors. Our goal is to impact the health span of people, ameliorate their quality of life, allowing them to enjoy their life with family, grandchildren, and friends feeling healthy, strong, and able to continue to enjoy the things they love, not frail and sick.

Meet the leaders behind the success of Turn Biotechnologies

CEO Anja Krammer

Anja Krammer’s background includes experience working with leading firms from various industries across the globe. Her breadth of experience spans from Fortune 500 companies the likes of AT&T and Medtronic to innovative startups in diverse markets, such as healthcare, technology, and consumer goods. She has raised hundreds of millions of dollars in capital; been a co-founder in several startups, leading one to a public listing on NYSE; and launched, acquired and sold brands and companies throughout her career. 

She serves on the boards of several companies and has been recognized for her leadership skills by the Silicon Review’s “50 most trustworthy companies” and the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s “50 fastest-growing private companies”.

Anja has dedicated herself to advocating for diversity and inclusion and has served as a board trustee for the Empire Health Foundation in Washington to promote health equity for all communities and the democratization of healthcare.

Co-Founder, Head of Research Vittorio Sebastiano

Vittorio Sebastiano, who co-founded Turn Biotechnologies in 2018, led development of the unique mRNA-based ERA^™ (Epigenetic Reprogramming of Aging) platform the company uses to produce tailored protein cocktails to rejuvenate targeted cells. He is the company’s head of research and chairman of its Scientific Advisory Board.

Vittorio, who is an associate professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Stanford University School of Medicine, operates the Sebastiano Lab within the school’s Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine.

The author of more than 50 scientific articles and frequent speaker at research conferences around the world, Vittorio is prominent in the emerging field of cellular reprogramming. He helped to pioneer the development of a new paradigm for treating aging and age-related diseases. He also led the team that first confirmed human cells can be reprogrammed using Turn Bio’s ERA platform.

Vittorio was the Woods Family Scholar in Pediatric Medicine at Stanford School of Medicine, has served as co-director of the Stanford Stem Cell PhD Program, and has received prestigious awards for his pioneering approach to induce cellular rejuvenation, including the 2017 American Federation for Aging Research (AFAR) Junior Investigator Award and the 2019 Breakthrough in Gerontology Award by AFAR and the Glenn Foundation.

“We are focused on reprogramming the epigenome – a network of chemical compounds and proteins that control cell functions by influencing which genes are active – to restore capabilities that are often lost with age.”