Michael Polansky is training an AI model on skin that’s still alive
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- Outer Biosciences keeps living human skin tissue alive for up to a month — well past the industry norm of a few days — using a proprietary system that feeds nutrients and removes metabolic waste from donor samples.
- An AI model at the company runs in a closed feedback loop: it predicts which chemicals will benefit a specific skin function, those chemicals are tested on living tissue, and results feed back to improve the next round of predictions.
- Michael Polansky founded Outer Biosciences in 2022 after running Sean Parker's family office and serving as executive director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy; he is also the romantic and business partner of Lady Gaga (Stefani Germanotta), who sits on the company's board.
- Since layering in AI, the startup now generates a new candidate roughly every six weeks with six active leads — up from two leads over 18 months under an earlier "brute force" approach.
- The company sources discarded plastic-surgery tissue through the National Disease Research Interchange and Cooperative Human Tissue Network, both NIH/NCI-funded biobanks that deliver samples de-identified within hours of surgery.
- Outer Biosciences is targeting cosmetic ingredients rather than drugs, sidestepping FDA approval in a market where only ~120-130 active ingredients are approved across 13 over-the-counter skin-drug categories.
Why it matters: By sidestepping FDA drug approval and targeting cosmetics, Outer Biosciences works in a market where only ~120-130 active ingredients are FDA-approved across 13 categories. Combining 30-day living tissue with a closed-loop AI has cut its discovery pace from two leads in 18 months to a new candidate every six weeks.
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