Dr Steve Austad is the Protective Life endowed Chair in healthy aging research at the Department of Biology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He recently visited Ireland and took part in a ‘Science of Business’ podcast interview with fellow scientist and serial entrepreneur Louise Grubb. Dr Austad is a renowned researcher in the area of aging and is currently seeking to understand the underlying cause of aging; specifically, his long-term goal is the development of medical interventions that slow the entrance of the decay of human health. Steve is the author of more than 200 scientific articles and more than 150 newspaper columns on science. His book ‘Why We Age’ about the body’s journey through life has been translated into eight languages. And his new book Methuselah’s zoo, which is what nature can teach us about living longer, healthier lives will be released later this year.

Speaking on efforts that we all can make in preventing age-related illness, Dr Austad says, “I don’t think people appreciate that the biggest threat to human health these days is aging. It’s not cancer. It’s not Alzheimer’s disease, not heart disease. It’s because aging underlies all those things. So if we can actually target these fundamental aging processes, then all these things can be delayed together.

I don’t think it’s a mystery, but I do think it’s something that often gets overlooked and when we start talking about drugs we need to consider that, these things are going to work together with lifestyle choices the most exciting and unexpected finding in recent years is the way that physical activity some people will say exercise but I prefer to say physical activity because it doesn’t have the connotation that you have to be dripping sweat and go to the gym to do it. But how that affect so many things, not just your muscles in your heart and your lungs. But it’s even a fantastic preventative for dementia. And who would have thought about this, but we now know that your muscles when they’re working, they produce hormones. These hormones actually cross the blood-brain barrier and get into your brain. So, we now have some good ideas about how physical activity can lead to preserving mental agility. And I don’t think anyone would have predicted that. I certainly wouldn’t have and those are the kinds of things that anyone can do.

Nobody is for keeping people alive in a more and more frail and feeble state for longer and longer and longer. That would be a fool’s errand and from the evidence from the animals that we have, it looks like what we’re really doing is preserving health, not preserving frailty. So that’s the sort of lifestyle choices we make and there are some obvious ones there like maintaining a healthy weight and you know, eating well, right, and they’re all related.”

Dr Austad also discusses aging research and the fact that the one chosen mammal ‘the mouse’ out of all 5,000 mammals is one of the ‘most unsuccessful mammals at aging’ is strange. While he feels that the mouse holds a role in scientific research that in order to be more accurate in research for human aging then ‘companion animals are an obvious choice because they share so many diseases with people.’

Amongst other fascinating topics, Dr Austad also discusses ‘The Dog Aging Project’, how females have such a greater chance of living longer – even as premature babies and why that is. He also talks about his array of past careers from Lion Tamer to NYC cab driver to author and celebrated scientist.

The Science of Business podcast is hosted by Waterford native Louise Grubb. Founder of NutriScience, Q1 Scientific and TriviumVet. In this episode, Louise discusses some fascinating insights on human health and scientific research with Dr Austad. Her role as CEO of TriviumVet which specialises in the development of drugs and other medical devices to treat chronic diseases in companion animals positions her with key insights for this interview. The company has already developed several veterinary drugs and Louise shared in the podcast interview that TriviumVet is “very close to making a breakthrough” in the development of a completely novel drug to treat cardiac disease in cats and in dogs.

‘The Science of Business’ podcast series is filled with high-quality episodes offering valuable business insights, career stories and start-up successes from some of Ireland’s top entrepreneurs and business people. The Science of Business podcast episodes are now available to listen to at https://scienceofbusiness.ie/ and wherever you get your podcasts.

ENDS

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The Science of Business podcast episodes are now available to listen to at https://scienceofbusiness.ie/ and wherever you get your podcasts.

Today on International Women’s Day serial entrepreneur Louise Grubb shares her own career journey on the podcast ‘The Science of Business’ following her being awarded the ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ award at the Waterford Chamber annual business awards which took place last Friday, March 4th 2022.

Louise has an incredible track record of business success. Driven by innovation, Louise is currently working on her third successful start-up within the science and pharma sector.

Dr Mahony is an Obstetrician & Gynaecologist, a Specialist in Maternal and Fetal medicine and an Honorary Clinical Professor with RCSI. She previously served as Master of the National Maternity Hospital in Dublin from 2012 to 2018. She recently joined the board of Halocare and currently serves on the Board of St Vincent’s Healthcare Group. During the interview, Dr Mahony speaks of her experiences at school, through her career to now working with Trinity Business School in an area that will see a broader education for medical students. She also speaks about collaboration in healthcare stating that “it is deeply absent in medicine” and that the Pandemic has offered us a flavour of what can be achieved when we work together.

Ruth is Head of Cluster and Insulins Manufacturing at Sanofi. Here, she recalls some of her career experiences, ranging from early roles in the UK beer and soft drinks sectors, to leadership in Sanofi via a stint at Waterford Crystal. She also speaks about Waterford’s appeal as a great place to live and work, and the importance of lifelong learning. Ruth also discusses some of the lasting changes to global business arising from COVID-19, and how mRNA is a breakthrough moment for pharma.

In this insightful interview with Louise, co-founder of Eirgen Pharma Patsy Carney also discusses how his early interest in science was ignited at secondary school. He details his extensive career journey, including how his decision to take an MBA with his work colleague Tom Brennan, would lead them to develop the business plan for what would become one of the country’s more successful indigenous pharmaceutical companies. Patsy also goes onto detail new venture Kinetic Labs, a Waterford-based facility offering state-of-the-art single and shared wet lab space – the first of its kind in Ireland.

Q1 Scientific stores pharmaceutical samples at very specific temperatures for 11 of the top 20 pharma companies in the world. In discussion with Louise, Stephen recognised that the Pfizer BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine will need to be stored at subzero temperatures, and that there are distribution challenges in rolling out both that and Moderna’s vaccine across Ireland. However he sounded a positive note by explaining that Q1 Scientific already stores and distributes medical drugs at this level, and is ready to provide its services to store and distribute the anticipated vaccines.

Chanelle McCoy is the founder of McCoy Health. In this discussion with Louise, she shares her insights on growing a global business and her plans to roll out a ten minute finger prick test to check if an individual has had COVID19. The All-Ireland Business Champion Award winner and Dragon’s Den funder Chanelle tells of key moments in her incredibly successful career, which saw her bring the family pharma business into 96 countries around the world and secure over 2,500 product licences. She also chats about building McCoy Health which focuses on developing pharmaceutical-grade cannabidiol (CBD) and the rights to distribute the ground-breaking ‘SugarWatch’, a needle-free glucose monitoring device for diabetics, across Ireland.

Laois native Tom is co-founder of speciality healthcare company EirGen Pharma, and, more recently, co-founder and director of Triviumvet. In this podcast he discusses how his early career started at Clonmel Healthcare and moved to IVAX a few years later. He took a leap and set up his own Pharmaceutical company, after undertaking a part-time MBA at University of Limerick. It was there he met Patsy Carney, and Tom tells the story of they came up with the idea of setting up Eirgen Pharma together.

Frank shares his incredible career journey from the starting point at Temple Street Children’s Hospital, to his former role as Chair of the HSE, to establishing his global businesses Rigney Dolphin and international healthcare company Relate Care. He also speaks of working remotely, and how, as a result of Covid19, businesses will place more scrutiny on productivity levels than ever before and a recalibrating of how employees are managed into the future.

Louise’s guest on this episode is Orlaith Ryan, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Shorla Pharma, a Tipperary based pharmaceutical company. Along with her business partner Sharon Cunningham, Orlaith set up the company in 2018, after several years working in the pharmaceutical industry. In this episode of “The Business of Science,” she chats to Louise about her career to date, and what motivated her to go out on her own. Louise’s guest on this episode is Orlaith Ryan, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Shorla Pharma, a Tipperary based pharmaceutical company. Along with her business partner Sharon Cunningham, Orlaith set up the company in 2018, after several years working in the pharmaceutical industry. In this episode of “The Science of Business,” she chats to Louise about her career to date, and what motivated her to go out on her own.