San Fran­cis­co-based Aeov­ian Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals has banked $37 mil­lion in Se­ries A fi­nanc­ing to launch its mTORC1 in­hibitor in­to a proof-of-con­cept for what the com­pa­ny says is an undis­closed rare CNS dis­ease.

Linked to a num­ber of ag­ing and nu­tri­ent-sens­ing process­es, the mTOR path­way has typ­i­cal­ly been seen as a rich tar­get for phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies hop­ing to make in­roads in lifes­pan/healthspan ex­ten­sion. The se­cre­cy be­hind the ‘undis­closed dis­ease’ is not un­usu­al in a field where re­search is of­ten paint­ed with the broad brush of ‘age-re­lat­ed dis­eases.’ Part of Aeov­ian’s IP comes from the Buck In­sti­tute in No­va­to, Cal­i­for­nia, an in­de­pen­dent re­search in­sti­tute ded­i­cat­ed sole­ly to study­ing con­nec­tions be­tween ag­ing and chron­ic dis­ease.

The mech­a­nisms be­hind mTOR — the mam­malian tar­get of ra­pamycin — are not ful­ly un­der­stood, but re­searchers be­lieve it plays key roles in cell me­tab­o­lism, growth and sur­vival, point­ing to a role in tu­mor for­ma­tion and type 2 di­a­betes, among oth­ers.

ven­Bio Part­ners and Sofinno­va In­vest­ments co-led the round, who joined found­ing in­vestors Apol­lo Health Ven­tures and Evotec SE.