California Life Sciences / The Biotech Stack
Amy Wang shares how the CLS FAST program helped PebRx refine its clinical strategy toward neurovascular inflammation in Alzheimer’s disease, and why inflammation is an increasingly compelling therapeutic target.
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MESH Strategic Partnerships, Keck School of Medicine of USC
Lilian Jin, PhD, Pre-IND Project Manager at PebRx, presented at the LA BioStart–USC session alongside leaders from USC Stevens, Amgen, and the USC/CHLA cGMP laboratory.
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Keck School of Medicine of USC
The Norman and Mary Pattiz Foundation gift supports drug discovery, early detection, AI-driven identification of brain inflammation molecules, and a new registry for high-risk individuals at the USC Center for Personalized Brain Health.
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USC Today
Hussein Yassine, MD, and collaborators across Keck, USC Dornsife, and the USC Mann School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences received NIH funding to develop a selective cPLA2 inhibitor targeting brain inflammation in APOE4 carriers.
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Linked cPLA2-related lipid ratios and transcriptomic activation scores to late-life cognitive decline in postmortem brain samples from the Religious Orders Study and Rush Memory and Aging Project.
Acta Neuropathologica Communications (2026)
Demonstrated associations between cPLA2 activation, synaptic dysfunction, and Alzheimer's pathology.
NPJ Drug Discovery (2026)
Reported discovery of the BRI-Series, novel selective cPLA2 inhibitor chemotypes with strong translational potential.
Alzheimer's & Dementia (2026)
Outlined the emerging role of cPLA2 signaling in APOE4-associated vascular inflammation and Alzheimer's disease.
ACS Chemical Neuroscience (2023)
Reported synthesis and preclinical evaluation of 18F-FDHA as a PET probe for imaging brain DHA uptake, foundational work supporting PebRx's PET tracer platform.
Molecular Neurodegeneration (2022)
Showed that APOE4 activates cPLA2, providing foundational mechanistic evidence linking ApoE4 biology to cPLA2-mediated neuroinflammatory signaling.
Alzheimer's Research & Therapy (2022)
In postmortem brain tissues, identified lipid changes consistent with cPLA2 activation as a key pathway in APOE4-associated brain inflammation.
Alzheimer's & Dementia (2022)
Provided preclinical proof-of-concept that pharmacological cPLA2 inhibition improves memory and reduces neuroinflammation in APOE4 models.
Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences (2022)
Reviewed single cell-type lipidomics approaches to understanding APOE4-driven neuroinflammation.
Current Opinion in Lipidology (2021)
Reviewed how APOE4 activates cPLA2, altering arachidonic acid and DHA signaling cascades and driving chronic brain inflammation in Alzheimer's disease.
Alzheimer's Research & Therapy (2017)
Used PET imaging to show increased DHA incorporation coefficients in several brain regions among APOE4 carriers, including the entorhinal cortex.
JAMA Neurology (2017)
Reviewed observational and clinical trial evidence on DHA supplementation in APOE4 carriers across predementia and dementia stages of Alzheimer's disease.
Alzheimer's Research & Therapy (2016)
Established foundational evidence linking APOE genotype to brain lipid delivery, the scientific question that launched the PebRx research program.
