In this episode of the Sunny Ray Show, host Sunny Ray talks with Ilya, founder and CEO of General Biophysics, a Framingham, Massachusetts biotech developing xenon gas as a therapeutic. The conversation traces an unusual origin story: the company began by trying to stop frozen seafood from smelling fishy, which led to freezing and reviving a small Australian crayfish using pressurized, cold xenon gas that forms snowflake-like structures with water instead of damaging ice crystals. That discovery revealed a biophysical mechanism, xenon disrupts lipid rafts in cell membranes, making cells nonreactive to external stress signals. Ilya explains how this insight moved the company from platelet and red blood cell preservation for transfusion into neurological therapeutics, including published Alzheimer's research on microglia, the brain's immune cells. He describes building a vertically integrated business around gas recovery, relying heavily on non-dilutive NIH funding, and balancing a focused clinical indication like opioid use disorder against a broader multi-disease platform. He closes with advice for scientific entrepreneurs: start with the technology's function, then find its application.
A biotech founder explains how freezing a lobster with xenon gas led to Alzheimer's research and new therapeutics.
What is General Biophysics and how did you end up waking a frozen lobster?
Our story started with a lobster. We were trying to stop seafood from smelling fishy after thawing, so we looked at cryopreservation and found an article on xenon gas. Under pressure and cold, xenon forms snowflake-like structures with water instead of damaging ice crystals. We froze a small Australian crayfish, revived it after 24 hours, and it lived for three more days.
How did General Biophysics move from food and blood preservation into neurological therapeutics?
Two things pushed us there. First, as a small company we needed funding, and preservation technology is not therapeutic, which limits fundraising. Second, we realized the mechanism that makes cells nonreactive to signaling could help manage inflammation. Xenon was already approved in Europe for anesthesia with reported neuroprotective effects, so we began studying Alzheimer's models and discovered we could change the phenotype of the brain's immune cells, the microglia.
What did the lobster experiment actually prove scientifically, and what might it mean for longevity?
It proved we could form snow-like structures with water instead of ice crystals that puncture cells, but the process is not very controllable, so it did not translate directly to freezing humans. What we learned instead was a biophysical mechanism: xenon disrupts lipid rafts in the cell membrane, making it more fluid and making cells nonreactive to stress signals like inflammation cascades. That led directly into our Alzheimer's research.
Was there a point where the platelet preservation business could have become the whole company?
It's still a very interesting approach. Platelets can only be stored about five to seven days because cooling activates them and they get cleared from circulation. Our technology makes platelets numb to that cold stimulus so they can be stored for fourteen days instead of five. Demand from the transfusion industry is real, and with NIH support we hope to start clinical trials early next year.
Why build the whole system instead of licensing the science out and staying narrow?
We're repurposing a drug, xenon, so we don't own composition of matter patents. Instead our IP covers methods of treatment and, critically, how to recapture and reuse the gas economically, since it's rare and expensive. Our inhalation system is fully automatic and recovers gas after treatment, unlike earlier attempts that never caught on in Europe. That recovery capability is what makes the business case work.
Your funding relies largely on non-dilutive NIH grants. What did that path teach you that a venture backed founder might never learn?
We live in a country that lets new investigators build something from scratch if you're persistent. You start by finding academic collaborators for credibility, generate preliminary data, then apply for grants repeatedly. It took about five tries before we won our Alzheimer's grant. Once you're in the system and manage funds responsibly, you build credibility with agencies and unlock more resources, like NIH's I-Corps program.
For someone who's only heard of xenon as a gas in light bulbs, how do you explain what it's actually doing inside the body?
Xenon passes through the lungs into the bloodstream and dissolves poorly in water but very well in lipids, so it crosses the blood brain barrier quickly and builds a therapeutic concentration in the brain within two or three minutes. It's a multi-target drug, engaging receptors like NMDA and GSK3 beta rather than just one pathway, and once you stop the inhalation it clears from the body within about five minutes.
What's the first thing you'd tell a clinician or scientific entrepreneur who wants to start a company from an unexpected discovery?
In scientific entrepreneurship you start with the technology, not the market. Break down what your discovery actually does functionally, then find where that function is most needed. For us the function was preserving biological cells, and the champion application became blood component preservation for transfusion. From there, find academic collaborators for credibility, then pursue NIH and NSF funding. It took five attempts before we got our winning proposal.
Building something daring? Sunny talks to founders like this every day. Fifteen minutes to see if your story belongs on the stage.
Claim your pre-interview