Regenerative Sciences Institute

Our mission

Regenerative Sciences Institute (RSI) is a unique research/educational non-profit organization that is reshaping cooperative science and reimagining science education to develop the regenerative and synthetic biotechnologies necessary to alleviate the infirmities and diseases of aging. How? By creating the tools to program living systems as we program computers. By learning science directly from discovery. By instilling scientific courage and insight. By transforming research into inventions, and then entrepreneurial ventures. What would you do to stay healthy into old age, to have the time to live life full measure?

Who we are

RSI trains the next generation of scientific explorer/entrepreneurs while facilitating breakthroughs in regeneration and aging to cure devastating diseases.  Built upon the dreams and ideals of its founders, RSI employs education through scientific discovery and entrepreneurship through hands-on experience. Since 2006, RSI has been funded by the founders, and through small donations. Working on a shoestring budget, RSI has continued its mission — spawning a future generation of independent scientists — surviving on perseverance, passion, and creative necessity.

Aging population: the coming social, economic, and heath crisis

As we age, the risk of being diagnosed with age-related diseases such as cardiovascular disease, cancer or a neurodegenerative disorders increases exponentially. As a result of improved public health, the average American lifespan has steadily increased, and by 2030, 1 in every 4 Americans will be over the age of 65. Despite this, traditional research has been slow to produce cures or find the means to prevent major illnesses driven by the molecular and cellular damage caused by aging. The connection between devastating effects of aging and disease is seen most clearly in genetically inherited diseases, such as the progeroid syndromes whose victims experience accelerated aging and do not live beyond puberty. Victims die of the same major illnesses that afflict the elderly. For example, Gilford-Hutchinson Progeria patients die of cardiovascular disease (CVD), just like greater than 35% of the elderly. RSI is pursuing ways to slow or even halt aging in order to increase our healthy lifespan by preventing the fatal illnesses such as CVD that are associated with old age.

Our campaign

We are launching a major fundraising campaign to transform our operations and realize our mission: RSI is inextricably linking science education with research and technology development in order to accelerate discoveries needed to tame aging and prevent the onset of the major age-associated illnesses. Science/science education will no longer be confined to one classroom or laboratory, but will instead be possible wherever the worldwide communication network extends via the transformative power of virtual and augmented reality and laboratory automation. And consequently research will never be the same again. RSI integratively addresses the big questions of biology that have the greatest potential social impact with a focus on enhancing regenerative processes to extend your healthy lifespan. We are developing new technologies such as engineered personalized biological circuits which will integrate with your body to maximize health. We will become a self-sustaining organization while making a significant impact on the world through our educational programs, science and technology.  But we can not do it alone: we need your help to accomplish these ambitious goals.

Reimagine science education/STEM

RSI's novel approach to educating young people who are interested in science is: education only through scientific discovery and entrepreneurship. Our four-step sequential method involves immersion, incubation, formulation, and realization (IIRF) to train renascent Independent Scientist Explorers (rISE), scientists who explore fundamental questions as their intellectual forebears did, before the contemporary era of science as a commodity, when sheer productivity dominates quality. Students are taught to recognize and then solve significant unanswered questions. By not being told what to do, but rather by being encouraged to push the envelope, students are placed in a permissive environment, allowing their own creativity and originality to develop, independently of the repressive influence of social and cultural conformity.  Our approach reciprocally benefits both the educational and the scientific research process.

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