Education only. Not investment or medical advice. EverLife may earn a fee from links in this issue, and we only recommend things we believe benefit readers.
What you'll learn today:
Read time: 5 minutes
Moonshot Friday: the boldest bets on beating aging. Investor and author Kris Borer calls them the "three-pointers" of longevity.1
BRAIN REPLACEMENT
The U.S. Government Is Paying Scientists To Grow New Brain Tissue
Source: ARPA-H, Jul 10, 2025 and May 22, 2026
EverLife: Could it add healthy years? More than 20 million U.S. adults live with lasting damage to the neocortex, the brain's thinking layer, from stroke, injury or disease.2 ARPA-H, the U.S. health research agency, runs a 5-year program called FRONT to grow new brain tissue from a patient's own adult stem cells and graft it in to restore movement, sight and speech.2 In May it picked a team led by Sophrosyne Biosciences.3 Is the business strong? Not yet: this is government-funded research with no product.
Key Points:
Grafts are designed to grow into normal brain tissue and reconnect with the adult brain.3
The program runs in 3 phases over 5 years, aimed at preparing for human trials.23
ARPA-H says brain damage costs the U.S. health system more than $1 trillion a year.2
Details: The first targets are stroke and brain injury, not aging. Program manager Jean Hébert is the scientist Borer points to for replacing aging brain tissue piece by piece, which Borer expects could take decades.1
Where it trades: Sophrosyne Biosciences is private, and no public company is a direct way in today.
What it means for your health: If grafts can restore function after a stroke, researchers hope a similar approach may one day help repair brain tissue worn down by age. That has not been tested.
What it means for your money: Government programs pay for the riskiest early science. Watch which companies win the later phases and partnerships, since that is often where investable companies form.
Reader pick: AI is changing how new therapies get discovered. The Deep View is a free daily AI briefing read by 600,000+ founders and professionals. Subscribe free with one click →
WHOLE-BODY REPLACEMENT
A Longevity Fund Is Backing A Startup That Grows Brainless "Organ Sacks"
Source: Wired, Mar 2026; MIT Technology Review, Mar 30, 2026; Futurism, Mar 31, 2026
EverLife: Could it add healthy years? R3 Bio, a Bay Area startup, is developing what it calls nonsentient "organ sacks": animal bodies with organs but no brain, so they cannot think or feel pain. The first use is replacing lab animals in drug testing; the company's stated long-term goal is human versions that may one day supply organs for patients.4 Singapore longevity fund Immortal Dragons is an investor, and its CEO told Wired, "We think replacement is probably better than repair."4 Is the business strong? Too early to tell: R3 is in stealth, with no reported funding or data.4,5
Key Points:
MIT Technology Review reported a bigger vision of brainless human bodies for brain transplants. R3 says claims it intends to create human clones are "categorically false."5
Experts cite major barriers, including the law, safety and the lack of working artificial wombs.5
Borer sees full-body replacement as the far end of "replacement," and says it is not yet socially accepted.1
Where it trades: R3 Bio and Immortal Dragons are private.
What it means for your health: Nothing here reaches patients soon. The nearer benefit is safer drug testing that relies less on animals.
What it means for your money: Treat this as a signal of where longevity funds place long bets, not an opportunity you can act on. The milestone to watch: R3 leaving stealth with published data.
Reader pick: R3 Bio is private, so there is nothing to buy today. For ideas on income from public stocks, MaxDividends is a free newsletter where the author shares his own dividend portfolio and monthly income goal as he builds it. Subscribe free with one click →
ORGANS GROWN IN ANIMALS
Scientists Grew Kidneys That Were Up To 60% Human Inside Pig Embryos
Source: Cell Stem Cell, Sep 7, 2023; Undark, Sep 25, 2026
EverLife: Could it add healthy years? Researchers at the Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health grew early-stage kidneys made of 50% to 60% human cells inside pig embryos, for up to 28 days.6 The goal is organs grown from a patient's own cells, ending transplant waitlists. In September, Undark reported that Hiromitsu Nakauchi's lab in Japan achieved the first live births from human-animal chimera pregnancies, in mice, in work now under peer review.7 Is the business strong? Not yet: this is lab science, and U.S. federal funding for it has been on hold since 2015.7
Key Points:
The team transferred 1,820 embryos into 13 surrogate pigs and analyzed 5.6
The kidneys still contained pig blood vessels, which may trigger rejection.6
Human cells stayed mostly in the kidneys, with few in the brain.6
Details: Borer calls fixing the organ shortage the first step in replacement, and growing human organs in gene-edited pigs is one of his main routes.1
Where it trades: This is mostly academic work, with no public pure play yet.
What it means for your health: Organs grown from your own cells may one day mean shorter waitlists and fewer anti-rejection drugs, if the science works. It is years from human use.
What it means for your money: Watch for the first startups and for a change in U.S. funding rules. Either may signal a move from lab to business.
Reader pick: Big breakthroughs take years, so small daily choices matter now. The Cool Down is a free newsletter with simple, everyday changes to save more and waste less. Subscribe free with one click →
You Pick The Next Story
Which moonshot should I dig into next?
Investor Tip
Judge a moonshot by its next milestone, not its headline.
Moonshots fail more often than they succeed, so ask what has to be true next: what is the next proof point (animal data, a human trial, a published paper), who pays for it (grants, venture funds or revenue), and what could stop it (law, safety or running out of money).
Longevity 101: Kris Borer's 4 Roads To Radical Life Extension
In his 2026 book, Radical Life Extension, Borer argues that supplements and lifestyle add only modest years, and lays out bigger strategies:18
Drugs: medicines that slow aging. Useful, but he expects modest gains.
Advanced bioengineering: therapies that repair or reprogram cells.
Replacement: new organs and tissues, starting with the organ shortage and, far later, the brain.
Biostasis: preserving a person by vitrification, a deep-cold method that avoids ice damage, until future medicine can repair them.
How to use it: When you read about a longevity company, place it on this map. The further down the list, the bigger the possible payoff and the longer the wait.1
For Members
Members get my 25-point health and business scores on longevity companies and see which ones I'm watching most closely.
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Monday: the week’s biggest longevity progress and what it means for investors.
Hit reply and tell me: which moonshot would you most want to see succeed in your lifetime? I read every reply.
Eric
This newsletter is general and impersonal. Nothing in it is a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any security, and it doesn't consider your circumstances. Nothing here is an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any security. Company plans and dates are the companies' own statements, not my forecasts.
I hold no position in, and receive no pay from, any company named here. I hold personal equity in Repair Biotechnologies and Yuva Biosciences, neither discussed here. Treatments mentioned are experimental unless noted as approved.
Sources
1. Kris Borer, interview on the Free Radicals podcast (Substack); Foresight Institute talk, "Replacement Technology for Radical Life Extension," Dec 2025.
2. ARPA-H press release, "ARPA-H launches program to restore brain function and return patients to independence," Jul 10, 2025.
3. ARPA-H press release, "FRONT program selects performer team," May 22, 2026.
4. Emily Mullin, Wired, Mar 2026, on R3 Bio and Immortal Dragons (reposted by the Center for Genetics and Society, Mar 23, 2026).
5. MIT Technology Review, Mar 30, 2026; Futurism, "Startup pitching cloned human bodies," Mar 31, 2026.
6. Wang et al., "Generation of a Humanized Mesonephros in Pigs from Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells via Embryo Complementation," Cell Stem Cell, Sep 7, 2023.
7. Undark, "Engineering Animals to Grow Human Organs, But Not Human Minds," Sep 25, 2026.
8. Kristopher A. Borer, Radical Life Extension: Technological Strategies to Defeat Aging, Jul 6, 2026.