The Wisconsin Lab Using Evolution to Fight Obesity and Disease

Jacob Miller: So you brought me into the lab. One of the things you talked about was, uh, sending one of the squirrels into outer space, or many of them, I should say, which I was like, okay,

Ben Sajdak: this is getting really cool. The idea is you send these hibernating animals up to space to see if they can avoid some of the consequences of space.

So radiation is very harmful. Also, astronauts are known to sort of lose bone density and muscle mass rather quickly in zero gravity conditions. And they seem to avoid all of that in their hibernation cycle when they're not eating or drinking or sort of behaving as a normal mammal would. So we wanna see if that also applies in zero gravity conditions.

Welcome back to

Jacob Miller: the Startup Wisconsin Podcast, a show where you can learn about Wisconsin's growing tech scene to the stories of startups, founders, investors, and the talented people making it all happen. Today I'm talking with Ben Sajak, a director at Fauna Bio. Who's currently working out of a lab at EW Oshkosh.

Now, Fabio isn't Wisconsin based company. They're based in the Bay Area, but they've set up a lab here because of something pretty unique, a breeding colony of hibernating ground squirrels. I learned some wild facts in this conversation. These squirrels go into hibernation for six months, dropping their heart rate from 300 beats per minute to just three, and somehow avoid all of the health problems that would commonly kill you or me.

Phob Bioo studies these adaptations along with things like why elephants rarely get cancer, and uses machine learning tools to compare genetic data across hundreds of mammals. To develop new human therapeutics. We talk about the fascinating science behind it all, including a NASA project to send hibernating ground squirrels into space.

But we also dig into what it's like being part of a biotech startup in Wisconsin, the talent and resources available here that most people don't know about, and Ben's efforts to connect the Fox Valley Science community. So let's jump into my conversation with Ben Sja from Fauna Bio.

Ben Sajdak: We leverage millions of years of evolution.

To, uh, study disease adaptations and develop those into new human therapeutics. Wow. What does that really mean? Like to a normal person? How does that

Jacob Miller: impact

Ben Sajdak: like my life

Jacob Miller: someday?

Ben Sajdak: Yeah, so we. We all know people who have been affected by disease. Um, but we study critters who can avoid those diseases. Hmm.

And we share a lot of the same genes with those animals. They're not so different from you and I. Yeah. So we can really study, uh, those genes develop, um, hypotheses on how they avoid certain diseases. And then, um, develop and, and test new therapeutics based on certain, uh, disease conditions. Interesting.

Jacob Miller: I was listening to an interview with the, the, the CEO of, of Fabio, and she talked about her background in veterinary science mm-hmm.

And cancer research. And how she was kind of like, oh, why, like, there's cancer in animals too. But we've been so focused on just cancer in humans. Maybe speak to that a little bit, like why, why it's really important for us to be going into these other species and how, uh, it can be helpful for, I guess, things that we're dealing with as a, as a human race.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah. I think about this in, in two different ways. There's models of disease, so there's animals that, uh, suffer the same types of diseases in the same way that we do. Um, dogs getting cancer is one example of that, but then there are animals that completely avoid those diseases. Uh, naked mole rats and elephants come to mind.

Certain whales, they, uh, like never get cancer maybe once in a while, but wow. Um, they're really known for avoiding cancer. And so there's two different approaches there. You can sort of develop a treatment in an animal model of human disease. Or learn from its natural adaptations to avoid that disease.

And so we've kind of focused on the latter approach where we're studying the adaptations and disease avoidance within, um, mammals that can do that.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Um, I wanna kind of go back to like how you got involved with Fabio. Mm-hmm. And if you feel like you wanna talk about kind of like your career arc and then how you got to that point, I'm curious, like what was the connection between you being in Wisconsin.

And you're just, uh, your background and expertise and then working with Fabio.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah. Yeah. And I'll try to keep it short. I, yeah, so like I, I didn't know I wanted to be in science. Um, I was working like construction in the area. Um, but then I started like watching Planet Earth and Ted talks about science and Sure.

I kind of wanted to. Either do science or write about science. I ended up going to UW Oshkosh and getting a biology degree here, uh, and then going on for grad school to, to dig a little deeper. But I started working with hibernating, um, species animals that had have adaptations here at UW Oshkosh. And I've just been studying that at, at various stages throughout my training.

Um, and then we were able to. I sort of learned about Fauna Bio being developed, um, when I was in a postdoc, and that's exactly what I wanted to do with whatever career path I was going to choose was apply these adaptations to new human therapeutics. Um, and so it presented an opportunity to support the ground squirrel, uh, research happening on campus as well as grow our, uh, our tools and, and data sets within phone bio.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Very cool. Um. So what I learned today was that the work that you're doing with Fabio, uh, is tied to a, a breeding colony specific to Oshkosh, this area. Yeah. Or, you know, within Wisconsin, you know, why is that happening? Why is that significant? Maybe elaborate a little bit.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah. So the, the why is, uh, uh, largely accredited to curiosity of Dr.

Dana Merriman, who's been, uh, running and managing the, a ground squirrel colony at UW Oshkosh for almost 20 years now. Um, and the goal was based in, uh, uh, ophthalmology and retina research specifically. Traditional lab rodents aren't good at, at seeing at all. Hmm. And so we were kind of talking about the animal models.

Um, ground squirrels can see much better, and so they represent if you're trying to, uh, recreate a disease model condition in an animal you don't wanna use. Lab mice or lab rats. Mm. You'd wanna use something that sees more like us. Um, and ground squirrels fit that, uh, fit that quite nicely. And they also happen to hibernate every six months, uh, out of every year.

And so she, uh, developed a lot of collaborations and it turned into this research resource where she, she's sharing ground squirrels throughout the country and sometimes world and within the state, certainly. Um, to expand individual research programs and, and questions, um, throughout a lot of areas of biomedical science.

Jacob Miller: Very cool. That's awesome. Uh, is there like a specific part of, uh, the thing, the things that the squirrels can do within their biology that we're hoping to apply to, to like human health and healing and all that kind of stuff?

Ben Sajdak: Yeah, so I mentioned they hibernate, um, six months out of the year. Within that process, I was kind of showing you the cold room and where they, they'll just live in these hibernation pods for six months outta the year and not eat or drink or go to the bathroom.

Um, and they'll come in and out of this hibernation state, which is going from, uh, 300 beats per minute in a normal, active awake animal to three beats per minute in this hibernating condition. And they'll come in and out of the state every two weeks or so. Sure. And that transition. Is, you would think very stressful on a condition, on a, um, an entire system.

Um, but they avoid consequences of like reperfusion of blood through all the organ systems and throughout the entire body. If you study certain, uh, senses or cell types within the hibernation, uh, state in particular, these cells kind of fall apart and stay dormant, but are able to come back on and, and remain.

Uh, regain function very quickly after hibernation. And so there are a ton of different adaptations within, uh, that hibernation cycle that we can study. So we, we focus primarily on, uh, obesity currently, um, and heart disease, but there are lots of other interesting avenues to pursue as well.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Yeah. Um.

I'm kind of curious around if there's any role that, you know, you're obviously here at UW Oshkosh. Mm-hmm. Which is really, really cool. And obviously you went to school here, so there's obviously these ties. Um, you know, what is, is there, like, do you feel like there's a good support system here at, at the university or just within Oshkosh in general in regards to the type of work you're doing?

Ben Sajdak: Yeah, absolutely. I think, uh, it's been a natural fit because this is where the ground squirrel colony has been for so long. Um, but in addition to that sort of a startup kind of moving into campus, I think was a little new for them. Mm-hmm. But they've been very, uh, generous in terms of working with us using other universities of Wisconsin models for how to create these academic industry and startup partnerships.

Um, and yeah, they've been a, a really nice, uh, collaborating partner with. The sort of mutual, uh, agreements that we've been able to create where we get a little space to do some science, grow our data sets related to the ground squirrels, and then we, we kind of support, uh, them and uh, then that sort of funding goes to educational goals that they're interested in.

Yeah.

Jacob Miller: That's awesome. I'm curious around the tech side. Yeah. So you brought me into the lab. Mm-hmm. And one of the things you talked about was, uh, sending one of the squirrels into outer space, or many of them, I should say, which I was like, okay, this is getting really cool. Uh, I'm just curious around like, um, some of the technology you're using.

You know, maybe start with some of the hardware that you're gonna be using to understand these squirrels. And then, um. Maybe too, the software. I know you talked about some of the, the machine learning tools that you have and may maybe just kind of talk about if you're able to talk about the outer space stuff.

Yeah, that'd be super cool. Yeah.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah. So the, um, this is kinda led by, uh, my scientific colleague here who works, um, in Oshkosh as well. Dr. Ryan Springer. Um, he wrote a couple of grants to nasa, some phase one. Um. It's niac, I forget the acronym, but it's a, you know, a biomedical, um, research program that they have.

Um, and phase one being, you know, develop a prototype, see if, you know, this idea can actually work and can integrate into ideally, current systems that they have. Sure. Um, on things like the International Space Station. And so he's developed this, uh, nice pod that can, um, record biometric data from the animal.

So, uh, heart rate, uh, respiratory rate. Temperature certainly. But the idea is you send these hibernating animals up to space to see if they can avoid, um, uh, some of the consequences of space. So radiation's very harmful. Um, but also astronauts are known to sort of lose bone density and muscle mass, um, rather quickly in zero gravity conditions.

And they seem to avoid all of that in their hibernation cycle. Mm. When they're not eating or drinking or sort of behaving as a normal mammal would. Um, so we wanna see if that also applies in zero gravity conditions. Yeah. That's cool. Yeah. And then so the other, yeah. Yeah. The other tech that we sort of use at, at Fauna Bio certainly is our drug discovery platform.

Yes. So, once we, um, are interested in a disease indication. We look for adaptations against that disease. And then we use a platform called Convergence. And so our CTO, Linda Goodman has a large computational team, um, that develops these different platforms that, uh, aid in, in certain parts of drug discovery from comparing human data sets to not only ground squirrel internal data, but.

Um, all of the other hundreds of mammals that have had their genome sequenced, um, and a bunch of other tools as well. So that's the sort of platform drug discovery side?

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Like the way the interview I saw with her, the way, uh, it was described was like. This tool, they, are they able to find the needle in the haystack faster basically?

Yeah. But the data that you guys are collecting also like, makes the magnet bigger. Okay. Yeah. Now that we're gathering the things we really, really want, we're getting hyper-focused, smaller data sets, and then the accelerations faster with ML machine learning and stuff. Yeah. Which is really

Ben Sajdak: cool. We like to say, we like, uh, to use, uh, nature to help guide us Yeah.

And, and sort of solve the questions for us, rather than running these sort of massive multimillion dollar screens of. Sort of cell lines or animal studies or what have you. We just sort of focus on the DI specific disease question. Uh, find the animal that's good at avoiding that. And, and then from there we have a really focused lens for, uh, you know, learning about the genes that are involved in, in that, a adaptation.

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If you don't think we're working out within the first 45 days, ready to see how we can help you and your team, just head over to headway.io and book a free consultation today. Have you ever had a moment, uh, in the lab yet where you're like. This is like crazy. Like, I'm gonna, like this thing could, could change, you know, people's lives, like things like that change, like d different parts of society.

Um, yeah. Have you had those moments and I guess what does that feel like to

Ben Sajdak: you? You know? Yes, certainly. So, um, a couple come to mind. So what, uh, with our obesity project in particular, um, we're working with Eli Lilly and. So we'll get a lot of these, uh, targets. Like if we suppress this target, you know, it, uh, potentially reduces obesity.

And we find that in our platform and some of these targets are already known to reduce obesity and so it's not novel and so we move onto something else. But to me, that really validates the approach. Like we're able to not only find things that have already worked, but it really builds our confidence for the novel targets that are sort of.

Giving us a si similar signal and that no one's working on. Yeah. So that's been really cool and gives, like I said, a lot of confidence in moving into those programs with novel targets. Um, and then the other one that came to mind was something like, uh, the spiny mouse. Mm-hmm. We were kind of talking about spiny mice and they're sort regenerative capabilities.

Uh, super remarkable, very unique among mammals for sure. But like I mentioned, we're, we're not very different, like genetically speaking, uh, from these animals. So it's not a matter of like us not being able to do that thing, it's being able to find how they've evolved, uh, to do that and being able to find similar shared sort of genetic me, uh, mechanisms to find how we might apply that approach to ourselves.

Things like inflammation reduction for. Uh, avoiding scarring like these spiny me are so good.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. The, the interview that you, I listened to, it was from a couple years ago, uh, YouTube. It was like, uh, the woman you were talking to about this spiny mouse research is like. The idea, like you could, you know, create a compound basically, like could be applied to bandaids or things like that for regeneration.

So like if, you know, we're reducing scar tissue from surgery or just different things, you know, over the years that people experienced throughout their life for different reasons. Or she even said like, pacemakers being installed and like it being, um, rejected by the body. Like making that less likely.

Yeah. Um, it's, there's just so many applications, like, it's, it's really, really cool.

Ben Sajdak: So yeah, we have a,

Jacob Miller: a

Ben Sajdak: cool project. We don't have to talk about spine forever, but we could, um. We have a cool project where we did these uh, implants in the cortex, and so a lot of these neural implants, you get this cap encapsulation problem, which is just basically cellular scarring around that site, and it reduces signal and affects.

Know the data that they're trying to collect or the therapeutic that they're trying to apply. Yeah. And so we don't see that in the spiny mice. They don't have that same inflammatory response and scarring. And I think it's just like a couple steps away of figuring out, well, how, how are they reducing the inflammation response to these things?

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Yeah. Its, it's all like, it's crazy cool stuff. It's just, it's all, it's all fun to just think through. Yeah, for sure. Um, yeah. I kinda wanna go over to, um, just. Uh, you being in Wisconsin, Wisconsin's role in science, uh, and like, uh, biotech and biology and all that stuff. Mm-hmm. Because obviously with, with Madison University of Madison, you have Oshkosh.

Um. What do you think, like mixed Wisconsin, a really like underrated place, um, or a strong place, I should say. Mm-hmm. Um, for scaling science-based startups, like the one that you're working on, it's not, they're not based in Wisconsin, but obviously there's efforts here. Yeah. So what are your thoughts on like, you know, making that, uh, more of a, obviously with the bio forward program in Madison and they're expanding to Milwaukee, but, you know, maybe as a statewide effort, like how do you feel like it could kind of keep moving forward and, and be, be more fruitful?

Ben Sajdak: Yeah, so I. I'm very much like a biologist. And in the biomedical space alone, there's like no, between the institutions, you know, the big ones certainly, but even the other smaller universities of Wisconsin institutions like this one, there's really no science questions that we can't answer. Mm. There are labs that are specializing in the latest technology and stem cells and regenerative medicine and, and all these areas.

Um, so it can be done here. It's just a matter of sort of community building and teaching people that it's possible. Yeah. Uh, for us in particular, I think one of the, one of the hesitations was talent recruitment. And in my experience, that has not been a problem at all. Hmm. Like, we get, uh, maybe 10, uh, a 10th of the applicants that, um, you know, the Fauna HQ out in California might get for the same position.

But within that you get a lot of really hardworking Midwesterners that are interested in science and are super trainable and, um, have been great in, in the lab. And so, and they wanna get involved in research and they don't wanna move across the country to one of the coasts to, to do research. And so, uh, hopefully it's just.

A matter of creating it more often and this community building efforts, like the ones you're, you're involved in Yeah. I think are, are critical to sort of building the community and growing this even further.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Yeah. And again, we're just like, you know, one part of the puzzle. Like, we're not here to solve everything, but it's like we can definitely amplify what's happening.

Uh, tell the, tell the story better, like change the narrative around like, hey, like there's actually like a ton of talent here

Ben Sajdak: Yeah.

Jacob Miller: That wants to stay here, live here, work here. Mm-hmm. Um, and you know, you're a prime example of that. Like, hey. You can like build part of your startup here or grow part of your startup here Through the talent that's here.

Yeah. In the network that's here.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah. Yeah. I think, I think it's all possible.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Very cool. Um. So where do you think like maybe there's opportunities for the Wisconsin, like science community or the biotech community to, to grow or I guess like, do you feel like, oh, if there were more opportunities for people to get together, is it just awareness around the opportunities that folks in the field that live here don't realize are here?

Right. Because you, I think about what you're doing is like, wow, like how did, like the startup outta California. All of a sudden is like investing here. Yeah. In you, in the space and like everything. So I'm curious like how, what your thoughts are on that.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah, I think, um, yeah. Yeah. I think it is an awareness issue.

So I mean certainly there's really cool research going on at UW GB and Lawrence and these other places in the Fox Valley, and I'm not super aware of those projects. But yeah, there's probably potential for spin ups in startups and it's. Um, a lack of knowledge of, of tools and just being able to do it. In my case, um, it, it helps the ground squirrel colony be here, but, uh, and the animals are native to this area and so we can sort of develop the, an outbreak population and get a genetic, genetically diverse, uh, population to study.

Um, but we can, uh, um, I forget where I was going with that. No, it's

Jacob Miller: all good. Yeah. Yeah.

Ben Sajdak: But, uh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, why not Oshkosh? Right? Like Yeah. It is part of the point, like

Jacob Miller: why, I'd imagine like the cost, like the cost of, yeah. I mean, you know, the cost of like the lab being here. Yeah. Um, obviously, you know, there's difference of salaries obviously in different cities Yeah.

And d different, uh, geographic areas. Um, but like, it is interesting that like, like I'm curious, like you, you were saying like, oh, there's great research happening at Lawrence and Dbgb. Mm-hmm. What do you know about I am, I'm like, I don't know what's going on there. Like, could you tell me what you do know?

Yeah. So it makes me think about like. The narrative and the stories that we're not sharing. And they're kind of staying in like the science bubble? Yeah. Or, or like maybe even within those localized communities, like how do we really like. Amplify, like the things that are happening. So I guess maybe just talk about like what you do know is happening.

I'm just curious. Like, you know, so, so I, uh, to your point,

Ben Sajdak: I don't know much. Okay. I think we're pretty, we're pretty siloed in our universities. Sure. Especially the smaller ones that are focused on teaching, like that's kind of priority. Um, and rightfully so. But, um, I mean, there's these community building efforts that are happening and should continue to happen.

Mm-hmm. Um, I'm trying to start this Fox Valley Science Society where we do these. These talks, uh, every month or so. Yeah. At, at the science-based book club up in Appleton. That's awesome. And so recruiting speakers, so ask me in six months and I'll be able to tell you Yeah. What's are really cool and

Jacob Miller: let me know if you need help with that.

I, yeah. Like

Ben Sajdak: feedback on like how to

Jacob Miller: get it going

Ben Sajdak: and Yeah. Anything around it,

Jacob Miller: like happy to help. So

Ben Sajdak: there was someone who is doing some, uh, NASA related work at Lawrence. Wow. I just like had no idea. Yeah. You know, so I think it is a lot of these, I mean these events, these sort of networking events and, and um, community building efforts are.

Are underrated and so powerful.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Networks. I'm just thinking out loud right now, like, so we have a startup week coming up in November. Mm-hmm. Um, would love to, because that's basically six months from now. Yeah. Not to say that you'll be ready for everything, but I would love to like, hey, in, you know, for November, could we get a handful of folks to just share like, you know, kind of quick storytelling and pitching of like, here's the things we're doing at the universities here in the Fox Valley.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah.

Jacob Miller: You might not know this, but it's happening right here. Yeah. Like wow. Like the NASA thing, and it's like, that's so cool. Like, so I, I think there's an opportunity for us to showcase what you guys are doing. Yeah. Put a spotlight on it and just, and celebrate it. Like, I think that doesn't happen enough.

Yeah. And I think just also the opportunity for like you're, what you're doing wanna do for a really like, fun way to get people together and network and just talk and catch up and talk shop, you know? Yeah. Like, you know, BS about whatever. Yeah. It's like you just. 'cause that's, you need that in your life, right?

Because when you go home and like your, your family or spouse might not understand everything you're dealing with, and sometimes it's just nice to talk to someone that understands what you're dealing with. Yeah, exactly. You know? Um,

Ben Sajdak: so, you know, and, and it takes, it takes a bit of effort to create these things as you well know.

Um, but once they're created, I feel like the demand is there too. Yeah. Like, you know, the, the sort of announcement of this, of the science club and all that stuff is, is really gathering a lot of attention, uh, on social media and, and I think we'll, we'll draw a pretty nice crowd and these are just casual science discussions and stuff like that.

But yeah. Um, is based on a model of underground science society down in Milwaukee that's very successful and been running for like eight years. I didn't even know it

Jacob Miller: was a thing. Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. Um.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah. And so, and you get a lot of great feedback and ideas from like, and, and good practice for like being able to communicate your science to the general public.

But then also they have fascinating questions Yeah. From the out outside perspective of have you like thought about this part of hibernation and um, yeah. So I'm just really looking forward to Yeah. That part of it as well.

Jacob Miller: That's awesome. Yeah. Um. Well, I think we can wrap things up. I'm just curious, uh, where people can learn more about Fauna Bio and then if they have questions for you around Fa Fauna Bio, your career path or just anything that you're doing locally.

Like the the, the Science Club? Yeah. Yeah. Uh, how can, how can they learn more about Fauna Bio and then get connected

Ben Sajdak: with you? Yeah, the, the website's a good spot. Uh, f fauna bio.com. Um, my CEO does much more, uh, podcasts than I do, and so you can probably, uh, look up Ashley Zender, um, for various podcasts there.

Uh, Dr. Ryan Springer, the guy who's involved in the NASA work, um, was on Neil deGrasse Tyson's Star talk last, uh, October, I think it was. Oh, that's so cool. So that's a really cool episode to get the, um, the sort of science behind those projects and what we're interested in there. Um, and then yeah, personally, uh, I'm on LinkedIn.

I'm on your startup or, uh, your startup, Wisconsin Slack. Nice. Um, and uh, and email. Awesome. Thanks man. Really

Jacob Miller: appreciate it.

Ben Sajdak: Yeah, great to be here.

Jacob Miller: Yeah. Thanks for joining us on the Startup Wisconsin Podcast. Wanna support the show. Don't forget to subscribe and get updates. If you're feeling generous, you can share, rate and review our podcast to help others find us.

Alright folks, until next time, let's keep moving Wisconsin forward. I.