13 ms·

Natural occurring molecule rivals Ozempic in weight loss, sidesteps side effects

423 points by pseudolus 2y ago

cj 2y ago
What does "naturally occurring" mean in this context?
- Gys 2y ago
  > Svensson has co-founded a company to launch clinical trials of the molecule in humans in the near future. At least not so natural that just 'anybody' can put it in a bottle.
  - Etheryte 2y ago
    I think this is not really a charitable take. For one, nearly everything medical needs certain purity and concentration so you need specialized equipment. For two, even if a chemical is easy to produce by industrial standards, you still need to run trials to prove that it's both safe and actually does what you hope it does.
    - CharlieDigital 2y ago
      I wonder what the distinction here is between supplement and pharmaceutical. Could they have chosen to bring it to market as a supplement?
      - _aavaa_ 2y ago
        They could have, but they would have been seen as just another “weight loss supplement”. Which I imagine is a real uphill communication battle to convince people that you’re just not another scam.
      - amanaplanacanal 2y ago
        I expect it has to be injected. Can you sell injectable supplements?
        DonHopkins 2y ago
        Well Trump just pardoned Ross Ulbricht who sold unapproved injectable drugs, so you can at least get away with shipping them into the United States, as long as you're not Mexican or Canadian.
      - toast0 2y ago
        Supplements are often marketted with results from clinical trials; although typically not very rigorous trials. Raising money to do clinical trials doesn't indicate the path to market.
  - connicpu 2y ago
    Having to run trials has little to do with the whether the compound is naturally occurring and everything to do with the fact they intend to market it as a drug with specific effects
- FrustratedMonky 2y ago
  Most people think "natural" means they can just go into backyard, dig up some root, and get this for free. But its " Gila Monster’s venom". So natural, but you aren't going to just go out and eat it like resveratrol from wine. At this point, 'natural', just means made from atoms, yes atoms are naturally occurring.
  - Clubber 2y ago
    >At this point, 'natural', just means made from atoms, yes atoms are naturally occurring. That pretty much covers everything in the universe. I've always thought it was natural vs synthesized.
  - momocowcow 2y ago
    See food packaging laws. Natural versus artificial flavorings :)
    - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
      Have you checked out what qualifies for 'organic' according to laws. The laws aren't a good standard.
  - frankbreetz 2y ago
    I may be missing some of your sarcasm, but "Gila Monster's venom" meets the strictest definition of natural.
    - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
      Maybe, sarcasm was aimed at 'natural' being 'harmless' and/or common, because it is 'natural'. When really, just being 'natural', doesn't mean anything really. There are poisons that are 'natural'. Like resveratrol. Yes, it is natural and its in wine. But you need to drink many gallons a day to get enough to do anything. But people see 'Natural' and wine, and think it is a license to drink a lot.
- sharpshadow 2y ago
  I would say that the prohormone BPM/retinoic which BRP is derived from occurs in the body and is therefore natural. If it would be a derivate of BRP chemically similar patentable then it would not be natural. Even if BRP is made in the lab it’s still natural. AFAIK one can’t patent natural occurring molecules, only the process to make them.
- WithinReason 2y ago
  I wonder if it has to do with patentability
- HarHarVeryFunny 2y ago
  I'm assuming it means occuring somewhere in nature, but then the question is where. Is there some edible plant that contains this, perhaps?
  - cj 2y ago
    According to the article they tested tens of thousands of amino acid chain peptides and used “AI” to find this one and synthesized it. Unless we expect that every protein combination exists somewhere in nature, this pretty much by definition isn’t naturally occurring.
tromp 2y ago
If this really has the potential to compete with Ozempic, then it should have a noticeable impact on Novo Nordisk's stock value [1], but we're not seeing that yet. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/NVO/ https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/NVO/
- docdeek 2y ago
  The article refers to results in animals which means it is probably years - maybe a decade - from being approved. Novo’s patent protection expires in 2033 [0] so it could be that the market is not yet worried about a potential competitor that likely won’t get to market before the IP protection runs out. [0]: https://www.reddie.co.uk/2024/08/30/the-year-of-ozempic-an-ip-take/ https://www.reddie.co.uk/2024/08/30/the-year-of-ozempic-an-i...
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    And Novo (like many others) is already working on next-generation GLPs that’ll have new patent protection before Ozempic’s ends.
    - leereeves 2y ago
      Even so, competition from other GLP-1 drugs and generic semaglutide should make prices and profits lower.
      - droopyEyelids 2y ago
        If the companies combined can meet demand
        genewitch 2y ago
        They seem to be able to offer it at $300 if you pay without insurance. The implication being that they make 50 extra bucks because the insurance company only pays $250 for your $1,000 prescription.
boxed 2y ago
Isn't the molecule in Ozempic naturally occurring too?
- chpatrick 2y ago
  As far as I know GLP-1 is a naturally occurring hormone but it's not something you can just give people directly. Instead you give them artificial things like semaglutide that work on the same receptors.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    GLP-1 is a class of drugs (or molecules). The first known GLP-1 was pretty much just a synthesized version of a naturally occurring compound from the Gila Monster’s venom. Semaglutide is like a 2nd generation GLP-1 and there are 3rd generation ones in development right now
    - chpatrick 2y ago
      Semaglutide and co are "GLP-1 receptor agonists" that behave in a similar way to the naturally occurring hormone GLP-1. We can't give people GLP-1 itself because it breaks down really fast and you'd have to provide it continuously, so we use ones that effect the body the same way over a long period of time.
      - llamaimperative 2y ago
        Ah ah, I see what your original comment meant now! I parsed that completely differently :) Yes you’re right.
      - dbcooper 2y ago
        Yeah, halflife of GLP-1 is about 5 minutes.
    - Lanolderen 2y ago
      Gila Monster is a pretty cool name for a lizard
thom 2y ago
Delighted to discover this kind of breakthrough is based on a gnarly regular expression: https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/blob/main/FastaParser.py#L32 https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/blob/m...
- mkoubaa 2y ago
  Beautiful yet terrifying. I'm glad that regex isn't something I'll ever have to touch.
  - jagged-chisel 2y ago
    The good news is it’s read only- if you’re reading for understanding, you’re doing it wrong :-D
  - dleeftink 2y ago
    It's not that bad. AutoRegex[0] and regex gen [1] make it more accessible than ever. [0]: https://www.autoregex.xyz/ https://www.autoregex.xyz/ [1]: https://regex-generator.olafneumann.org https://regex-generator.olafneumann.org
    - janfoeh 2y ago
      Heh, I just fed autoregex a regex from one of my projects, and it simply times out. It comforts me to know that billion dollar LLMs have to chew on those just as much as I do.
      - dleeftink 2y ago
        A proper litmus test, what's causing the hang in your case? Regex to me, is pattern finding and abstraction taken to the extreme. I like the challenge
        janfoeh 2y ago
        Good question. The regex I tried is for extracting amounts in EUR and USD: / (?<=^|[ \t]) (?<currency_prefix_with_space> (?<currency_prefix> €|EUR|\$|USD ) [ \t]? )? (?<number> (?<integral> -? \d{1,3} (?:[\.,]\d{3}|\d*) ) [\.,] (?<fraction> \d{2,3} ) ) (?<currency_postfix_with_space> [ \t]? (?<postfix_or_ending> (?<currency_postfix> €|EUR|\$|USD ) ) | (?<ending> [ \t]|$|\n ) )/x
VagabundoP 2y ago
They mention AI used to weed out molecules but don't mention how it was used. I'd be interested in know did they use pre-trained models or train one from the ground up.
- lithos 2y ago
  https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-experiment-generated-40-000-hypothetical-bioweapons-in-6-hours-scientists-warn https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-experiment-generated-40-000-... For another example, and it actually calls out the name of the program.
- jqpabc123 2y ago
  I would expect some custom training was needed in order to address this highly specialized use case. There are 2 primary uses cases emerging where LLMs are proving advantageous. 1) Summarization --- where the results can be nebulous and it don't really much matter. For example, casual web search. 2) Research based on trial and error where the nebulous results will be subjected to thorough verification --- i.e. this case. In any case, the statistical results can be nebulous and using them without verification is a recipe for disaster. For example: https://www.lawnext.com/2025/02/federal-judge-sanctions-morgan-morgan-attorneys-for-ai-generated-fake-cases-in-court-filing.html https://www.lawnext.com/2025/02/federal-judge-sanctions-morg...
  - bitwize 2y ago
    I don't think it's a matter of firing up an LLM and saying "Hey LLM, please find me a molecule that acts on human GLP-1 receptors but does not have the negative side effects of semaglutide." And it's all like "Certainly! Here are some candidate GLP-1 agonists that blah blah blah..." It's probably more like AlphaFold -- a statistical model of molecular structure and action, not a language model.
- xhevahir 2y ago
  It looks like it's this: https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor Annoying that journalists call everything "AI" these days.
aitchnyu 2y ago
Is the muscle loss a side effect of the drug or of the weight loss?
- Dma54rhs 2y ago
  eating less calories always has that side effect, you can train and eat protein to minimize it tho just like with regular diet
- Bluescreenbuddy 2y ago
  The loss. You eat less so you're probably eating less protein. And if you used to be heavy then it's safe to say you probably had some muscle mass and you're going to lose that with the caloric deficit especially if you're not exercising.
- borgdefenser 2y ago
  Lean mass is just non-fat mass. That includes much more than just muscle. I can't find any evidence that GLP-1 are catabolic to muscle mass. There is no evidence I can find that GLP-1s do anything above what calorie restriction does. There is a linear relationship between calorie restriction and fat loss down to under 10% body fat. There is so much wrong information on calorie restriction from studies done on people who were literally starving with already very low body fat %. Then apply that to people with 25% body fat is just wrong. Westerners trying to lose weight don't have this problem. I think part of the obesity epidemic is this insane idea that calorie restriction is bad. Everyone kind of understands the thermodynamics of calories in / calories out. Everyone even kind of understands the benefits of fasting. At the same time though there is this nonsense that if you restrict calories too much you start burning all this muscle mass. It is patently absurd. Add up the calories of what a 250lb bodybuilder is eating for contest prep to lose fat and you will see they are "starving" too.
  - MrMcCall 2y ago
    YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY CORRECT. READ ^THIS^, FRIENDS. In the end, it really is just metabolic math. As a former wrestler who did some insane weight-losing in my youth, the muscle mass loss is due to extreme calorie restriction. Besides, just sitting around starving is not a good way to become healthier in the long run, and that's where the muscle loss will be worst. To be a true journey towards better health, dieting should be accompied by at least a lot of walking and some light weight training, in the minimum. And don't forget your supplements, kids (addressing general readership), because our foods are less nutrient dense in 2025, so find out if some supplements help energy levels on the downslope. Me and my teenagers have taken a sip / mini-gulp of a product called 'Orgain' daily for a month or so, and I have found my energy better, while having less cravings. An entire little 11oz single-size drink is way too much for me (too many vitamins, makes me sleepy), having 'just a little bit' is not at all scientific, but we seem to be thriving on that little bit of supplementation. And, as always, avoid those processed sugars, kids! Whole sugar cane is very, very good for us, but only in moderate doses. Processed sugar is the crack cocaine of sugar cane, as opposed to just chewing a leaf of the coca plant.
jleyank 2y ago
Remember, weight loss is a side effect of the Ozempic family of drugs. It was intended as a type 2 diabetes drug and it’s quite successful in that area. Once alternate applications are revealed, drug design gets involved to develop alternatives. Medchemists and marketeers are clever…
- Aurornis 2y ago
  > weight loss is a side effect of the Ozempic family of drugs. It was intended as a type 2 diabetes drug and it’s quite successful in that area. You can’t call it a side effect simply because the drug was first studied for a different condition. Weight loss is a primary effect of the drug and it’s the indication it was approved for after extensive research. Many drugs are first discovered while looking for some other effect.
  - poidos 2y ago
    Viagra is a famous example.
    - jleyank 2y ago
      As I said, marketeers are clever…. And physicians can prescribe for anything they’d like - pharma is restricted to approvals before advertising.
- derektank 2y ago
  That's not quite right. The clinical indication for Wegovy (and Zepbound for that matter) is, "As an adjunct to a reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity for chronic weight management in adult patients with an initial BMI of 30 kg/m2 or greater (obesity)". Obesity itself is the disease the drug is approved to treat. Now, Wegovy has the same active ingredient as Ozempic (Semaglutide), ditto for Zepbound and Mounjaro (Tirzepatide), and the latter have been prescribed off label for weight loss in the past but it's not just a marketing gimmick. These are different drugs in the eyes of the FDA because they are prescribed for different things (obesity vs. type 2 diabetes).
zzzeek 2y ago
"The study would not have been possible without the use of artificial intelligence to weed through dozens of proteins in a class called prohormones." "the researchers designed a computer algorithm they named "Peptide Predictor" to identify typical prohormone convertase cleavage sites in all 20,000 human protein-coding genes." so look, when I have to go around talking to normies, they're like, "don't you think AI is going to take over everything?" and for these folks, "AI" means *one thing*: chatgpt or similar LLMs. So when they read this, they're like, "see? AI! we need AI everywhere! chatgpt assistants!" and then I pretty much have to lose my shit and they think I'm crazy, because they have no clue. This is also kind of like how it is deep inside all the corporate hype departments so many of us have to endure where our management is chucking shitty LLM garbage at us all day ordering us to "integrate this ! integrate that! we need AI (by which they mean hallucinating chatbots)". That is NOT what they used here. They wrote their own algorithm which we'd assume uses some straightforward machine learning approach such as bayesian filtering (edit: it's literally just a python + R script with some training data: https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/tree/main https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/tree/m...) . and in fact, I bet the researchers are calling this short script "AI" because their investors/bosses/managers are demanding they "use AI". Machine learning is a WAY more accurate term than "AI" which IMO is a completely useless hype term at this point, and it's making our lives as engineers worse having to deal with the whole world thinking robots are taking over and making our bosses obsessed with our having to "use AI" for everything (which is of course because they'd eventually like to have fewer employees).
DamnInteresting 2y ago
I wonder how this molecule will compare with gold nanoparticles [1]. Headline: Gold outperforms common weight loss drugs – and leaves muscles alone [1] https://newatlas.com/disease/obesity/gold-nanoparticles-obesity/ https://newatlas.com/disease/obesity/gold-nanoparticles-obes...
- Procrastes 2y ago
  > and leaves muscles alone But might destroy your bone marrow's ability to create blood cells[1]. 1. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/aplastic-anemia/symptoms-causes/syc-20355015 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/aplastic-anem...
- catigula 2y ago
  Does anyone actually believe that GLP-1s directly target muscle tissue? Losing a ton of weight, especially very quickly, is extremely catabolic. Any substance that prevents this would by definition be an anabolic substance.
braza 2y ago
Maybe this one relates more with the Americans because Ozempic became a trend there: Why are most people jumping on this drug? At least for me, besides all the cliches and stereotypes about the USA people, there's huge access to nutrition, gyms, surgical procedures, capital for buying healthy food, and medicine in general.
- BugsJustFindMe 2y ago
  > At least for me...there's huge access to...capital. This is not true for more people in the US than the populations of most other countries. It's also weird to ask why people would do the obvious easy thing that takes no time or effort over the thing that takes more time and more effort. I bet you also make the exact same decision in a bunch of other contexts every day. Just use the pattern matching part of your brain to apply the same motivation to a new context.
- bee_rider 2y ago
  Nutritious food is harder to prepare and/or doesn’t taste as good in some cases, surgeries and other drugs have side effects, gym is a pain to go to. Also even though the US has high wages, everybody feels vaguely poor and stressed about money for some reason. There are a lot of little nickel-and-dime fees because we don’t have a good safety net, consumer protection, and we don’t have public healthcare. (I’m not on Ozempic and I recently lost weight by just eating less, but I get why people want it, the alternatives are annoying).
- derektank 2y ago
  Exercise is great for your health, but it generally has a negligible effect on weight loss because exercise doesn't actually consume that many calories. The biggest benefit of exercise on weight loss is the temporary exercise-induced anorexia that occurs in very high intensity workouts.
  - Der_Einzige 2y ago
    You are so full of shit. I get on the treadmill for 1 hour and consume 700 calories in that hour. Heavy exercise also causes improved appetite and sleep regulation as it fixes your blood sugar levels. This leads to your demand for food and especially the worst kinds to paradoxically go down for most fat people (they were already eating too many calories) Calories in and calories out shows that I will durably lose weight over a several month period with 1 hr on the treadmill every other day - a totally doable number for motivated people. I swear to gosh that all the people who say “you can’t outrun your fork” are fatties. The issue is that the willpower to exercise for most people is trash. Most people who claimed they did high impact exercise and didn’t see weight loss simply didn’t actually do high impact exercise.
SubiculumCode 2y ago
I'm disappointed that a lot of the GLP-1 drugs are losing the emergency compounding rules that lowered the price to about $200/month, instead of $500 to $1000/month it will be by April.
RandomWorker 2y ago
On Google I find that this is already used to treat diabetes: https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/semaglutide-subcutaneous-route/description/drg-20406730 https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/semaglutide-sub... here are the side effects; Side Effects Along with its needed effects, a medicine may cause some unwanted effects. Although not all of these side effects may occur, if they do occur they may need medical attention. Check with your doctor immediately if any of the following side effects occur: More common Belching Bloated, full feeling Constipation Diarrhea Excess air or gas in the stomach or intestines Gaseous stomach pain Heartburn Indigestion Nausea Passing gas Stomach discomfort, fullness, or pain Vomiting Less common Recurrent fever Yellow eyes or skin Rare Burning feeling in the chest or stomach Stomach upset Tenderness in the stomach area Incidence not known Anxiety Blurred vision Chest tightness Chills Cold sweats Confusion Cool, pale skin Cough Darkened urine Difficulty swallowing Discouragement Dizziness Fast heartbeat Feeling sad or empty Headache Hives, itching Increased heart rate Increased hunger Irritability Lack of appetite Large, hive-like swelling on the face, eyelids, lips, tongue, throat, hands, legs, feet, or sex organs Loss of consciousness Loss of interest or pleasure Nightmares Pains in stomach, side, or abdomen, possibly radiating to the back Puffiness or swelling of the eyelids or around the eyes, face, lips, or tongue Redness of the skin Seizures Shakiness Skin rash Slurred speech Tiredness Trouble breathing Trouble concentrating Trouble sleeping Unusual tiredness or weakness Some side effects may occur that usually do not need medical attention. These side effects may go away during treatment as your body adjusts to the medicine. Also, your health care professional may be able to tell you about ways to prevent or reduce some of these side effects. Check with your health care professional if any of the following side effects continue or are bothersome or if you have any questions about them: Less common Hair loss Rare Bleeding, blistering, burning, coldness, discoloration of the skin, feeling of pressure, hives, infection, inflammation, itching, lumps, numbness, pain, rash, redness, scarring, soreness, stinging, swelling, tenderness, tingling, ulceration, or warmth at the injection site Change in taste Loss of taste Other side effects not listed may also occur in some patients. If you notice any other effects, check with your healthcare professional.
thayne 2y ago
Since it is naturally occurring, it isn't patentable. Which means it is less likely that companies will develop a commercial product from it. Why pay to get FDA approval, if you don't get a government granted monopoly on it afterwards? This is one problem with using patents as the mechanism to incentivise development of medicine.
- ramoz 2y ago
  The article did refer to patents. https://patents.google.com/?inventor=Katrin+Svensson https://patents.google.com/?inventor=Katrin+Svensson It would seem they are modifying peptides. Which is patentable.
- nine_k 2y ago
  If the molecule itself is not patentable, the process of efficient extraction or synthesis may be. So, if somebody can come up with it, they may have a thriving business. The substance in question is a peptide. It's not something you simply extract from a plant using a solvent. OTOH, being a peptide, it's likely easy enough to produce in a genetically engineered bacterium or yeast. Efficient extraction may remain a problem though, because you'll need to select a particular protein fragment (the peptide) from reams of other protein fragments of the bacterial / fungal cells you process.
  - frodo8sam 2y ago
    The extraction problem has been solved for a long time to make recombinant insuline. Before that it had to be extracted from an animals pancreas. These days peptides are often improved using non-natural amino acids to make them more stable and thus longer acting. Semaglutide is a good example. These are synthesized using solid-phase synthesis.
- catigula 2y ago
  I've always been very, very skeptical of this claim. If there's an actual natural, identified substance with huge benefits to people, it's going to go gangbusters and you're going to make a lot, LOT of money selling it, even if you're doing it via roadside lemonade stand. It feels like this claim is usually used to promote cures and treatments with extremely low quality RCTs backing their use as a sort of panacea. I used to believe the "just do shrooms to cure depression" claims on principle until I looked into the quality of those studies, which is very low. At that point, you're just making stuff up.
raylad 2y ago
This is the press release that is being republished with ads in the post link https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2025/03/ozempic-rival.html https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2025/03/ozempic-rival...
- anotherpaul 2y ago
  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-08683-y https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-08683-y This seems to be the paper, but its behind a paywall. Anyone with access can tell me if they publish the 12mer amino acid sequence? Is there more to it (post translational modifications) Or is it just the peptide?
  - archimedes237 2y ago
    Note, I have access but this is not my field. I just asked ChatGPT your question after have it read the paper. This is what the response was: Yes, the paper provides the 12-mer amino acid sequence of BRP: THRILRRLFNLC . Regarding post-translational modifications, the BRP peptide was synthesized with a C-terminal amidation, which was critical for its bioactivity. The non-amidated version of BRP was inactive in vitro . Additionally, the paper mentions that the C-terminal cysteine (C12) was synthesized as a free thiol . So, BRP is not just a simple peptide—it has a key post-translational modification (C-terminal amidation) that influences its function.
    - anotherpaul 2y ago
      Very nice, thank you. This indeed answers my question.
stevenhubertron 2y ago
I read the article, didn't see what foods contain that molecule.
- ddalex 2y ago
  Humans produce it naturally.
bzmrgonz 2y ago
They are not gonna tell us the source of the molecule? I wanna know which berries or legumes to consume... damnit!!!
- stubish 2y ago
  My guess to the most probable source is the human body...
  - sschueller 2y ago
    Soylenpic...
- genewitch 2y ago
  Pretty hard to go wrong with blueberries. I'm not saying that they contain the molecule, but I mean, they're generally good for you.
steele 2y ago
sarm goblins will find a way to ruin this
ThinkBeat 2y ago
Since it is a natural occurring molecule, and given this report detailing it, does it mean that production could be cheap and easy?
- tasty_freeze 2y ago
  I know nothing about the topic, but I do know that insulin is a naturally occurring molecule but it wasn't a slam dunk. For years it was extracted from pig and cow pancreases collected from slaughterhouses and fed into a blender, but it required a lot of development to filter out the non-insulin molecules. In fact, some people would eventually develop allergies to their animal-derived insulin due to the trace amounts of other proteins that would slip through. One of the first targets of genetic engineering in the mid 70s was putting a human insulin gene into e coli (I think yeast was tried too). But it isn't that easy -- the e coli genome needed other changes to prevent the e coli from degrading the molecule, as it was a waste product as far as the e coli was concerned. It took until 82 or so before that was viable. But that isn't the end of it. The insulin generated is not active -- it needs to be cleaved from the "cluster" that the generated molecule into individual active insulin proteins. That naturally takes a few hours, which isn't great for diabetics because they need to anticipate their need hours ahead and if they overshoot they can go into a coma, and if they undershoot it takes hours to correct it. It took years to design "fast insulin" which can be absorbed in under half an hour. I know all this only because the most recent "Daniel and Kelly's Extraordinary Universe" episode: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-daniel-and-kellys-extraord-29862087/ https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-daniel-and-kellys-extraor...
- dghlsakjg 2y ago
  Naturally occurring has little to do with cost of production. Coral snake venom is naturally occurring and has medicinal uses. $4,000 per gram.
  - yellowapple 2y ago
    I'm sure coral snake venom would be a lot cheaper if coral snake farms were more commonplace.
refurb 2y ago
A molecule that is a GLP-1 mimetic that has only been tested on animals? I’ll hold my breath.
amai 2y ago
…in mice!

423 points by pseudolus 2y ago

cj 2y ago

What does "naturally occurring" mean in this context?

Gys 2y ago
> Svensson has co-founded a company to launch clinical trials of the molecule in humans in the near future. At least not so natural that just 'anybody' can put it in a bottle.
- Etheryte 2y ago
  I think this is not really a charitable take. For one, nearly everything medical needs certain purity and concentration so you need specialized equipment. For two, even if a chemical is easy to produce by industrial standards, you still need to run trials to prove that it's both safe and actually does what you hope it does.
  - CharlieDigital 2y ago
    I wonder what the distinction here is between supplement and pharmaceutical. Could they have chosen to bring it to market as a supplement?
    - _aavaa_ 2y ago
      They could have, but they would have been seen as just another “weight loss supplement”. Which I imagine is a real uphill communication battle to convince people that you’re just not another scam.
    - amanaplanacanal 2y ago
      I expect it has to be injected. Can you sell injectable supplements?
      - DonHopkins 2y ago
        Well Trump just pardoned Ross Ulbricht who sold unapproved injectable drugs, so you can at least get away with shipping them into the United States, as long as you're not Mexican or Canadian.
    - toast0 2y ago
      Supplements are often marketted with results from clinical trials; although typically not very rigorous trials. Raising money to do clinical trials doesn't indicate the path to market.
- connicpu 2y ago
  Having to run trials has little to do with the whether the compound is naturally occurring and everything to do with the fact they intend to market it as a drug with specific effects
FrustratedMonky 2y ago
Most people think "natural" means they can just go into backyard, dig up some root, and get this for free. But its " Gila Monster’s venom". So natural, but you aren't going to just go out and eat it like resveratrol from wine. At this point, 'natural', just means made from atoms, yes atoms are naturally occurring.
- Clubber 2y ago
  >At this point, 'natural', just means made from atoms, yes atoms are naturally occurring. That pretty much covers everything in the universe. I've always thought it was natural vs synthesized.
- momocowcow 2y ago
  See food packaging laws. Natural versus artificial flavorings :)
  - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
    Have you checked out what qualifies for 'organic' according to laws. The laws aren't a good standard.
- frankbreetz 2y ago
  I may be missing some of your sarcasm, but "Gila Monster's venom" meets the strictest definition of natural.
  - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
    Maybe, sarcasm was aimed at 'natural' being 'harmless' and/or common, because it is 'natural'. When really, just being 'natural', doesn't mean anything really. There are poisons that are 'natural'. Like resveratrol. Yes, it is natural and its in wine. But you need to drink many gallons a day to get enough to do anything. But people see 'Natural' and wine, and think it is a license to drink a lot.
sharpshadow 2y ago
I would say that the prohormone BPM/retinoic which BRP is derived from occurs in the body and is therefore natural. If it would be a derivate of BRP chemically similar patentable then it would not be natural. Even if BRP is made in the lab it’s still natural. AFAIK one can’t patent natural occurring molecules, only the process to make them.
WithinReason 2y ago
I wonder if it has to do with patentability
HarHarVeryFunny 2y ago
I'm assuming it means occuring somewhere in nature, but then the question is where. Is there some edible plant that contains this, perhaps?
- cj 2y ago
  According to the article they tested tens of thousands of amino acid chain peptides and used “AI” to find this one and synthesized it. Unless we expect that every protein combination exists somewhere in nature, this pretty much by definition isn’t naturally occurring.

tromp 2y ago

If this really has the potential to compete with Ozempic, then it should have a noticeable impact on Novo Nordisk's stock value [1], but we're not seeing that yet. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/NVO/ https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/NVO/

docdeek 2y ago
The article refers to results in animals which means it is probably years - maybe a decade - from being approved. Novo’s patent protection expires in 2033 [0] so it could be that the market is not yet worried about a potential competitor that likely won’t get to market before the IP protection runs out. [0]: https://www.reddie.co.uk/2024/08/30/the-year-of-ozempic-an-ip-take/ https://www.reddie.co.uk/2024/08/30/the-year-of-ozempic-an-i...
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  And Novo (like many others) is already working on next-generation GLPs that’ll have new patent protection before Ozempic’s ends.
  - leereeves 2y ago
    Even so, competition from other GLP-1 drugs and generic semaglutide should make prices and profits lower.
    - droopyEyelids 2y ago
      If the companies combined can meet demand
      - genewitch 2y ago
        They seem to be able to offer it at $300 if you pay without insurance. The implication being that they make 50 extra bucks because the insurance company only pays $250 for your $1,000 prescription.

boxed 2y ago

Isn't the molecule in Ozempic naturally occurring too?

chpatrick 2y ago
As far as I know GLP-1 is a naturally occurring hormone but it's not something you can just give people directly. Instead you give them artificial things like semaglutide that work on the same receptors.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  GLP-1 is a class of drugs (or molecules). The first known GLP-1 was pretty much just a synthesized version of a naturally occurring compound from the Gila Monster’s venom. Semaglutide is like a 2nd generation GLP-1 and there are 3rd generation ones in development right now
  - chpatrick 2y ago
    Semaglutide and co are "GLP-1 receptor agonists" that behave in a similar way to the naturally occurring hormone GLP-1. We can't give people GLP-1 itself because it breaks down really fast and you'd have to provide it continuously, so we use ones that effect the body the same way over a long period of time.
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      Ah ah, I see what your original comment meant now! I parsed that completely differently :) Yes you’re right.
    - dbcooper 2y ago
      Yeah, halflife of GLP-1 is about 5 minutes.
  - Lanolderen 2y ago
    Gila Monster is a pretty cool name for a lizard

thom 2y ago

Delighted to discover this kind of breakthrough is based on a gnarly regular expression: https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/blob/main/FastaParser.py#L32 https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/blob/m...

mkoubaa 2y ago
Beautiful yet terrifying. I'm glad that regex isn't something I'll ever have to touch.
- jagged-chisel 2y ago
  The good news is it’s read only- if you’re reading for understanding, you’re doing it wrong :-D
- dleeftink 2y ago
  It's not that bad. AutoRegex[0] and regex gen [1] make it more accessible than ever. [0]: https://www.autoregex.xyz/ https://www.autoregex.xyz/ [1]: https://regex-generator.olafneumann.org https://regex-generator.olafneumann.org
  - janfoeh 2y ago
    Heh, I just fed autoregex a regex from one of my projects, and it simply times out. It comforts me to know that billion dollar LLMs have to chew on those just as much as I do.
    - dleeftink 2y ago
      A proper litmus test, what's causing the hang in your case? Regex to me, is pattern finding and abstraction taken to the extreme. I like the challenge
      - janfoeh 2y ago
        Good question. The regex I tried is for extracting amounts in EUR and USD: / (?<=^|[ \t]) (?<currency_prefix_with_space> (?<currency_prefix> €|EUR|\$|USD ) [ \t]? )? (?<number> (?<integral> -? \d{1,3} (?:[\.,]\d{3}|\d*) ) [\.,] (?<fraction> \d{2,3} ) ) (?<currency_postfix_with_space> [ \t]? (?<postfix_or_ending> (?<currency_postfix> €|EUR|\$|USD ) ) | (?<ending> [ \t]|$|\n ) )/x

VagabundoP 2y ago

They mention AI used to weed out molecules but don't mention how it was used. I'd be interested in know did they use pre-trained models or train one from the ground up.

lithos 2y ago
https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-experiment-generated-40-000-hypothetical-bioweapons-in-6-hours-scientists-warn https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-experiment-generated-40-000-... For another example, and it actually calls out the name of the program.
jqpabc123 2y ago
I would expect some custom training was needed in order to address this highly specialized use case. There are 2 primary uses cases emerging where LLMs are proving advantageous. 1) Summarization --- where the results can be nebulous and it don't really much matter. For example, casual web search. 2) Research based on trial and error where the nebulous results will be subjected to thorough verification --- i.e. this case. In any case, the statistical results can be nebulous and using them without verification is a recipe for disaster. For example: https://www.lawnext.com/2025/02/federal-judge-sanctions-morgan-morgan-attorneys-for-ai-generated-fake-cases-in-court-filing.html https://www.lawnext.com/2025/02/federal-judge-sanctions-morg...
- bitwize 2y ago
  I don't think it's a matter of firing up an LLM and saying "Hey LLM, please find me a molecule that acts on human GLP-1 receptors but does not have the negative side effects of semaglutide." And it's all like "Certainly! Here are some candidate GLP-1 agonists that blah blah blah..." It's probably more like AlphaFold -- a statistical model of molecular structure and action, not a language model.
xhevahir 2y ago
It looks like it's this: https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor Annoying that journalists call everything "AI" these days.

aitchnyu 2y ago

Is the muscle loss a side effect of the drug or of the weight loss?

Dma54rhs 2y ago
eating less calories always has that side effect, you can train and eat protein to minimize it tho just like with regular diet
Bluescreenbuddy 2y ago
The loss. You eat less so you're probably eating less protein. And if you used to be heavy then it's safe to say you probably had some muscle mass and you're going to lose that with the caloric deficit especially if you're not exercising.
borgdefenser 2y ago
Lean mass is just non-fat mass. That includes much more than just muscle. I can't find any evidence that GLP-1 are catabolic to muscle mass. There is no evidence I can find that GLP-1s do anything above what calorie restriction does. There is a linear relationship between calorie restriction and fat loss down to under 10% body fat. There is so much wrong information on calorie restriction from studies done on people who were literally starving with already very low body fat %. Then apply that to people with 25% body fat is just wrong. Westerners trying to lose weight don't have this problem. I think part of the obesity epidemic is this insane idea that calorie restriction is bad. Everyone kind of understands the thermodynamics of calories in / calories out. Everyone even kind of understands the benefits of fasting. At the same time though there is this nonsense that if you restrict calories too much you start burning all this muscle mass. It is patently absurd. Add up the calories of what a 250lb bodybuilder is eating for contest prep to lose fat and you will see they are "starving" too.
- MrMcCall 2y ago
  YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY CORRECT. READ ^THIS^, FRIENDS. In the end, it really is just metabolic math. As a former wrestler who did some insane weight-losing in my youth, the muscle mass loss is due to extreme calorie restriction. Besides, just sitting around starving is not a good way to become healthier in the long run, and that's where the muscle loss will be worst. To be a true journey towards better health, dieting should be accompied by at least a lot of walking and some light weight training, in the minimum. And don't forget your supplements, kids (addressing general readership), because our foods are less nutrient dense in 2025, so find out if some supplements help energy levels on the downslope. Me and my teenagers have taken a sip / mini-gulp of a product called 'Orgain' daily for a month or so, and I have found my energy better, while having less cravings. An entire little 11oz single-size drink is way too much for me (too many vitamins, makes me sleepy), having 'just a little bit' is not at all scientific, but we seem to be thriving on that little bit of supplementation. And, as always, avoid those processed sugars, kids! Whole sugar cane is very, very good for us, but only in moderate doses. Processed sugar is the crack cocaine of sugar cane, as opposed to just chewing a leaf of the coca plant.

jleyank 2y ago

Remember, weight loss is a side effect of the Ozempic family of drugs. It was intended as a type 2 diabetes drug and it’s quite successful in that area. Once alternate applications are revealed, drug design gets involved to develop alternatives. Medchemists and marketeers are clever…

Aurornis 2y ago
> weight loss is a side effect of the Ozempic family of drugs. It was intended as a type 2 diabetes drug and it’s quite successful in that area. You can’t call it a side effect simply because the drug was first studied for a different condition. Weight loss is a primary effect of the drug and it’s the indication it was approved for after extensive research. Many drugs are first discovered while looking for some other effect.
- poidos 2y ago
  Viagra is a famous example.
  - jleyank 2y ago
    As I said, marketeers are clever…. And physicians can prescribe for anything they’d like - pharma is restricted to approvals before advertising.
derektank 2y ago
That's not quite right. The clinical indication for Wegovy (and Zepbound for that matter) is, "As an adjunct to a reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity for chronic weight management in adult patients with an initial BMI of 30 kg/m2 or greater (obesity)". Obesity itself is the disease the drug is approved to treat. Now, Wegovy has the same active ingredient as Ozempic (Semaglutide), ditto for Zepbound and Mounjaro (Tirzepatide), and the latter have been prescribed off label for weight loss in the past but it's not just a marketing gimmick. These are different drugs in the eyes of the FDA because they are prescribed for different things (obesity vs. type 2 diabetes).

zzzeek 2y ago

"The study would not have been possible without the use of artificial intelligence to weed through dozens of proteins in a class called prohormones." "the researchers designed a computer algorithm they named "Peptide Predictor" to identify typical prohormone convertase cleavage sites in all 20,000 human protein-coding genes." so look, when I have to go around talking to normies, they're like, "don't you think AI is going to take over everything?" and for these folks, "AI" means *one thing*: chatgpt or similar LLMs. So when they read this, they're like, "see? AI! we need AI everywhere! chatgpt assistants!" and then I pretty much have to lose my shit and they think I'm crazy, because they have no clue. This is also kind of like how it is deep inside all the corporate hype departments so many of us have to endure where our management is chucking shitty LLM garbage at us all day ordering us to "integrate this ! integrate that! we need AI (by which they mean hallucinating chatbots)". That is NOT what they used here. They wrote their own algorithm which we'd assume uses some straightforward machine learning approach such as bayesian filtering (edit: it's literally just a python + R script with some training data: https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/tree/main https://github.com/Svensson-Lab/pro-hormone-predictor/tree/m...) . and in fact, I bet the researchers are calling this short script "AI" because their investors/bosses/managers are demanding they "use AI". Machine learning is a WAY more accurate term than "AI" which IMO is a completely useless hype term at this point, and it's making our lives as engineers worse having to deal with the whole world thinking robots are taking over and making our bosses obsessed with our having to "use AI" for everything (which is of course because they'd eventually like to have fewer employees).

DamnInteresting 2y ago

I wonder how this molecule will compare with gold nanoparticles [1]. Headline: Gold outperforms common weight loss drugs – and leaves muscles alone [1] https://newatlas.com/disease/obesity/gold-nanoparticles-obesity/ https://newatlas.com/disease/obesity/gold-nanoparticles-obes...

Procrastes 2y ago
> and leaves muscles alone But might destroy your bone marrow's ability to create blood cells[1]. 1. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/aplastic-anemia/symptoms-causes/syc-20355015 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/aplastic-anem...
catigula 2y ago
Does anyone actually believe that GLP-1s directly target muscle tissue? Losing a ton of weight, especially very quickly, is extremely catabolic. Any substance that prevents this would by definition be an anabolic substance.

braza 2y ago

Maybe this one relates more with the Americans because Ozempic became a trend there: Why are most people jumping on this drug? At least for me, besides all the cliches and stereotypes about the USA people, there's huge access to nutrition, gyms, surgical procedures, capital for buying healthy food, and medicine in general.

BugsJustFindMe 2y ago
> At least for me...there's huge access to...capital. This is not true for more people in the US than the populations of most other countries. It's also weird to ask why people would do the obvious easy thing that takes no time or effort over the thing that takes more time and more effort. I bet you also make the exact same decision in a bunch of other contexts every day. Just use the pattern matching part of your brain to apply the same motivation to a new context.
bee_rider 2y ago
Nutritious food is harder to prepare and/or doesn’t taste as good in some cases, surgeries and other drugs have side effects, gym is a pain to go to. Also even though the US has high wages, everybody feels vaguely poor and stressed about money for some reason. There are a lot of little nickel-and-dime fees because we don’t have a good safety net, consumer protection, and we don’t have public healthcare. (I’m not on Ozempic and I recently lost weight by just eating less, but I get why people want it, the alternatives are annoying).
derektank 2y ago
Exercise is great for your health, but it generally has a negligible effect on weight loss because exercise doesn't actually consume that many calories. The biggest benefit of exercise on weight loss is the temporary exercise-induced anorexia that occurs in very high intensity workouts.
- Der_Einzige 2y ago
  You are so full of shit. I get on the treadmill for 1 hour and consume 700 calories in that hour. Heavy exercise also causes improved appetite and sleep regulation as it fixes your blood sugar levels. This leads to your demand for food and especially the worst kinds to paradoxically go down for most fat people (they were already eating too many calories) Calories in and calories out shows that I will durably lose weight over a several month period with 1 hr on the treadmill every other day - a totally doable number for motivated people. I swear to gosh that all the people who say “you can’t outrun your fork” are fatties. The issue is that the willpower to exercise for most people is trash. Most people who claimed they did high impact exercise and didn’t see weight loss simply didn’t actually do high impact exercise.

SubiculumCode 2y ago

I'm disappointed that a lot of the GLP-1 drugs are losing the emergency compounding rules that lowered the price to about $200/month, instead of $500 to $1000/month it will be by April.

RandomWorker 2y ago

On Google I find that this is already used to treat diabetes: https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/semaglutide-subcutaneous-route/description/drg-20406730 https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/semaglutide-sub... here are the side effects; Side Effects Along with its needed effects, a medicine may cause some unwanted effects. Although not all of these side effects may occur, if they do occur they may need medical attention. Check with your doctor immediately if any of the following side effects occur: More common Belching Bloated, full feeling Constipation Diarrhea Excess air or gas in the stomach or intestines Gaseous stomach pain Heartburn Indigestion Nausea Passing gas Stomach discomfort, fullness, or pain Vomiting Less common Recurrent fever Yellow eyes or skin Rare Burning feeling in the chest or stomach Stomach upset Tenderness in the stomach area Incidence not known Anxiety Blurred vision Chest tightness Chills Cold sweats Confusion Cool, pale skin Cough Darkened urine Difficulty swallowing Discouragement Dizziness Fast heartbeat Feeling sad or empty Headache Hives, itching Increased heart rate Increased hunger Irritability Lack of appetite Large, hive-like swelling on the face, eyelids, lips, tongue, throat, hands, legs, feet, or sex organs Loss of consciousness Loss of interest or pleasure Nightmares Pains in stomach, side, or abdomen, possibly radiating to the back Puffiness or swelling of the eyelids or around the eyes, face, lips, or tongue Redness of the skin Seizures Shakiness Skin rash Slurred speech Tiredness Trouble breathing Trouble concentrating Trouble sleeping Unusual tiredness or weakness Some side effects may occur that usually do not need medical attention. These side effects may go away during treatment as your body adjusts to the medicine. Also, your health care professional may be able to tell you about ways to prevent or reduce some of these side effects. Check with your health care professional if any of the following side effects continue or are bothersome or if you have any questions about them: Less common Hair loss Rare Bleeding, blistering, burning, coldness, discoloration of the skin, feeling of pressure, hives, infection, inflammation, itching, lumps, numbness, pain, rash, redness, scarring, soreness, stinging, swelling, tenderness, tingling, ulceration, or warmth at the injection site Change in taste Loss of taste Other side effects not listed may also occur in some patients. If you notice any other effects, check with your healthcare professional.

thayne 2y ago

Since it is naturally occurring, it isn't patentable. Which means it is less likely that companies will develop a commercial product from it. Why pay to get FDA approval, if you don't get a government granted monopoly on it afterwards? This is one problem with using patents as the mechanism to incentivise development of medicine.

ramoz 2y ago
The article did refer to patents. https://patents.google.com/?inventor=Katrin+Svensson https://patents.google.com/?inventor=Katrin+Svensson It would seem they are modifying peptides. Which is patentable.
nine_k 2y ago
If the molecule itself is not patentable, the process of efficient extraction or synthesis may be. So, if somebody can come up with it, they may have a thriving business. The substance in question is a peptide. It's not something you simply extract from a plant using a solvent. OTOH, being a peptide, it's likely easy enough to produce in a genetically engineered bacterium or yeast. Efficient extraction may remain a problem though, because you'll need to select a particular protein fragment (the peptide) from reams of other protein fragments of the bacterial / fungal cells you process.
- frodo8sam 2y ago
  The extraction problem has been solved for a long time to make recombinant insuline. Before that it had to be extracted from an animals pancreas. These days peptides are often improved using non-natural amino acids to make them more stable and thus longer acting. Semaglutide is a good example. These are synthesized using solid-phase synthesis.
catigula 2y ago
I've always been very, very skeptical of this claim. If there's an actual natural, identified substance with huge benefits to people, it's going to go gangbusters and you're going to make a lot, LOT of money selling it, even if you're doing it via roadside lemonade stand. It feels like this claim is usually used to promote cures and treatments with extremely low quality RCTs backing their use as a sort of panacea. I used to believe the "just do shrooms to cure depression" claims on principle until I looked into the quality of those studies, which is very low. At that point, you're just making stuff up.

raylad 2y ago

This is the press release that is being republished with ads in the post link https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2025/03/ozempic-rival.html https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2025/03/ozempic-rival...

anotherpaul 2y ago
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-08683-y https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-08683-y This seems to be the paper, but its behind a paywall. Anyone with access can tell me if they publish the 12mer amino acid sequence? Is there more to it (post translational modifications) Or is it just the peptide?
- archimedes237 2y ago
  Note, I have access but this is not my field. I just asked ChatGPT your question after have it read the paper. This is what the response was: Yes, the paper provides the 12-mer amino acid sequence of BRP: THRILRRLFNLC . Regarding post-translational modifications, the BRP peptide was synthesized with a C-terminal amidation, which was critical for its bioactivity. The non-amidated version of BRP was inactive in vitro . Additionally, the paper mentions that the C-terminal cysteine (C12) was synthesized as a free thiol . So, BRP is not just a simple peptide—it has a key post-translational modification (C-terminal amidation) that influences its function.
  - anotherpaul 2y ago
    Very nice, thank you. This indeed answers my question.

stevenhubertron 2y ago

I read the article, didn't see what foods contain that molecule.

ddalex 2y ago
Humans produce it naturally.

bzmrgonz 2y ago

They are not gonna tell us the source of the molecule? I wanna know which berries or legumes to consume... damnit!!!

stubish 2y ago
My guess to the most probable source is the human body...
- sschueller 2y ago
  Soylenpic...
genewitch 2y ago
Pretty hard to go wrong with blueberries. I'm not saying that they contain the molecule, but I mean, they're generally good for you.

steele 2y ago

sarm goblins will find a way to ruin this

ThinkBeat 2y ago

Since it is a natural occurring molecule, and given this report detailing it, does it mean that production could be cheap and easy?

tasty_freeze 2y ago
I know nothing about the topic, but I do know that insulin is a naturally occurring molecule but it wasn't a slam dunk. For years it was extracted from pig and cow pancreases collected from slaughterhouses and fed into a blender, but it required a lot of development to filter out the non-insulin molecules. In fact, some people would eventually develop allergies to their animal-derived insulin due to the trace amounts of other proteins that would slip through. One of the first targets of genetic engineering in the mid 70s was putting a human insulin gene into e coli (I think yeast was tried too). But it isn't that easy -- the e coli genome needed other changes to prevent the e coli from degrading the molecule, as it was a waste product as far as the e coli was concerned. It took until 82 or so before that was viable. But that isn't the end of it. The insulin generated is not active -- it needs to be cleaved from the "cluster" that the generated molecule into individual active insulin proteins. That naturally takes a few hours, which isn't great for diabetics because they need to anticipate their need hours ahead and if they overshoot they can go into a coma, and if they undershoot it takes hours to correct it. It took years to design "fast insulin" which can be absorbed in under half an hour. I know all this only because the most recent "Daniel and Kelly's Extraordinary Universe" episode: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-daniel-and-kellys-extraord-29862087/ https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-daniel-and-kellys-extraor...
dghlsakjg 2y ago
Naturally occurring has little to do with cost of production. Coral snake venom is naturally occurring and has medicinal uses. $4,000 per gram.
- yellowapple 2y ago
  I'm sure coral snake venom would be a lot cheaper if coral snake farms were more commonplace.

refurb 2y ago

A molecule that is a GLP-1 mimetic that has only been tested on animals? I’ll hold my breath.

amai 2y ago

…in mice!