David Usharauli

Immunologist & Biotech Co-Founder @Tregeutix on a mission to harness the power of Tregs & microbiota | Calling on visionary investors to join our journey 🚀

[Dr. Abdul El-Sayed @AbdulElSayed]

Democrats will have a 56-seat majority in the US Senate. We need to use it. Pass Medicare for All.

[The Wall Street Journal @WSJ]

Breaking: Nvidia’s board is preparing to oust CEO Jensen Huang after he had two extramarital affairs, including one with a suspected Chinese spy. https://t.co/Pjsu5j87CF

[The Spectator Index @spectatorindex]

BREAKING: NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang reportedly had another affair with senior employee at the company, according to New York Times report.

[CNN @CNN]

Scott Colom will defeat Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith in a major upset to become the first Democrat that voters in deep-red Mississippi have elected to the chamber in more than four decades, CNN projects. https://t.co/LIrSavsJ01

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

Anthropic buying the so-called one-person biotech sounds to me more like self-dealing than a serious investment.

#Anthropic
#MithrilMedicine
#Biotech
#AI
#DrugDiscovery

https://t.co/95QsgVivry

[Bob Herman @bobjherman]

Welcome to the new era of fights over out-of-network medical bills. It’s no longer just health care providers vs. health insurers. Employers — like Joe Hancock, who owns a plumbing business in KY — are now getting sued by providers to pay up. https://t.co/vqYKRs6YvA

[Waggoner Lab @LabWaggoner]

Suppression of epithelial proliferation and tumorigenesis by IgA
@rockefelleruniv @Nature @UCLA
https://t.co/FjIi6inlZF

[Hemant Mehta @hemantmehta]

A nursing student said his faith barred him from getting a COVID vaccine.

The Iowa Supreme Court looked at the evidence—including the fact that he had no problem vaping or drinking—and unanimously rejected his religious exemption claim.

https://t.co/cWzxspxJK7

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

https://t.co/jt9EPDgWkq

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

The Weekend Tunes

KING: Tu Mil Jaaye | Shah Rukh Khan, Deepika
(🇮🇳 India 🇬🇧 UK)

Ed Sheeran’s fast-paced rap adds a great touch to the soundtrack of the upcoming Bollywood film "King".

Shared for educational/commentary purposes only.

#WorldMusic 🌍 🎧
#MusicUnites ❤️🎵

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

@almasjalair @dei26307613 Can you explain why old maps label the territory of present-day Kazakhstan as “Kirghiz” and refer to its inhabitants as Kirgiz?

[Conor Rogers @conorjrogers]

Austin Texas sounds like an Eastern European city that just overthrew a dictator

[ella | saw DnP 💫 @phantomellax]

Living in Florida is like being a kid in an orphanage and watching everyone else get adopted by a new loving family

[Wafik S. El-Deiry, MD, PhD, FACP @weldeiry]

Scientific Reports on hold in PubMed while NLM reevaluates journal

Scientific Reports, published by Springer Nature, has around 50 full-time deputy, senior and associate editors, and more than 11,000 editorial board members. Its article processing charge is $2850.

https://t.co/KACcWd9hKL

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

https://t.co/2kN0pjfq9A

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

The Weekend Tunes

Eric Nam 에릭남 - Psycho (🇺🇸 USA🇰🇷South Korea )

Shared for educational/commentary purposes only.

#WorldMusic 🌍🎧
#MusicUnites ❤️🎵

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

Given how little we understand the rules of engagement of the innate immune system, companies developing NK cells, macrophages, or even DCs as therapeutics should think twice. Better to invest in T cells. They’re a much safer bet.

#science
#immunology
#biotech

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

Innate cells, incl. NK cells, face 3 challenges as immunotherapeutics: 1. short lifespan 2. unpredictable functional plasticity and 3. recognition systems tuned to each body’s immune setting. Allo-NK cells may work in one patient, fail in another or become overactive in a third.

[The San Diego Union-Tribune @sdut]

San Diego biotech lays off nearly all its staff after drug trial failure and 2 patient deaths https://t.co/MyTuNzFdai

[Waggoner Lab @LabWaggoner]

Existing antibodies that increase dengue virus replication are associated with acute inflammation and limited development of protective immunity
https://t.co/ZU3hoivfZz @ScienceTM

[David Usharauli @3DiMMUNE]

Obviously, good for him, but I wonder how much scientific analysis went into this decision. It feels more like, “I know you, I like you, here’s a suitcase full of money. The science? Don’t worry about it.”

#Science
#AI
#anthropicAI
#mithril

[Professor Oak @Prof_Oak_]

Surprise 1: Anthropic acquired a one-person biotech
.
.
.
Surprise 2: that person is me
Surprise 3: I’m here to tell you all about it

Yes, this is what you think it is; after 6 yrs of increasingly loose anonymity: the Professor Oak reveal post

…and yes, it has gotten so boring around here that I’m literally doxxing myself to spice up the timeline

-------
Ok, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Cody Tranbarger. I mostly tweet, but occasionally find time to dabble in drug dev & starting/building biotechs. My past lives span the VC, crossover, startup continuum; Prof Oak has been my way of keeping a digital foot in those worlds, despite having my physical feet planted elsewhere.

The past 18 mo, ‘elsewhere’ was Mithril Medicine, a co. I founded to develop bsAbs for LAMA2-CMD & other ECM-related genetic diseases.

Mithril was born out of hands-on building with @MikeNGladstone, @JasonPaulRhodes, @LifeSciVC, & team @atlasventure. Somehow, I made enough half-decent calls along the way (even a broken clock is right twice a day, eh?) to convince them Mithril/I warranted a small seed. While I can hardly rationalize such an outrageously cavalier bet, I’m grateful for it, & I'd partner with Atlas again in a heartbeat.

In typical AV fashion, Mithril’s primordial form was virtual, decentralized, & ultra-lean. This stage tends to be short-lived, but for Mithril, it worked surprisingly well, for surprisingly long, thanks in part to the rapid maturation of the AI tools I used liberally.

Eventually, Mithril became a bit of an experiment itself - to find the upper bound of how far it could scale as a single operator + a bunch of Claude (+ a stellar bench of part-time consultants).

In parallel, I started spending time with @nc_frey, @an1lam, & @CoefficientBio team; and promptly experienced, for the 1st time, AI at the frontier. Soon thereafter, Mithril stopped looking like an experiment, & started looking like a preview of an entirely new operating model.

From that spark came “Pipeline-in-a-Person.” The idea immediately resonated when we shared it here back in April; and it was central to the shared vision that led to Anthropic’s acquisition of Mithril, & my joining the team.

Why join Anthropic? Three reasons.
(1) For Mithril, the programs continue, with more resources & infrastructure behind them, and as much Claude as I can put to work.

(2) For me, the chance to start several more programs, & find out how many one person can actually run in parallel - an almost unprecedented luxury for a curious drug hunter.

(3) For our mission, a path to institutionalize & scale this new way of working, then put it in the hands of all of biopharma, all over the world - which, candidly, I find the most energizing.

Will AI x Bio cure diseases? Unequivocally yes, imo… but not by the route that gets the most airtime. Rather than timeline acceleration & compression, I see orchestration & parallelization as today's low-hanging fruit.

Most drug hunters see a handful of go/no-go calls in a career, & spend entirely too much of the rest trading emails (my inbox can attest).

Give them the bandwidth to run several programs at once, and the time to focus on scientific judgment, and I’m willing to bet they’ll make better calls. And at scale, better calls translate to more drugs, higher hit rates, broader patient impact, & likely, a disease or 10 or 100 cured. I couldn't be more excited to build toward that future @AnthropicAI.

Finally, a heartfelt thank you to BioTwitter/X. The end of anonymity is bittersweet, but if anyone’s earned a proper introduction, you all have.

It’s difficult to overstate how much this app has done for me: a decade of education, plenty of friends, many job opportunities, several mentors, a few investors, even a co-founder (fmr). It was the generosity of this community that inspired me to start posting 6 years ago, after just as many years lurking. I hope I’ve been able to pay it forward, in my own small way.

But, to be clear, Prof Oak isn’t going anywhere. Same beat, same themes, and now, a front-row seat to drug development at the frontier. Stay tuned for dispatches from the trenches; and remember...

Gotta Cure 'Em All