September 2025 update

In short

Zhittya expanded FGF-1 manufacturing at its lab in Reno, Nevada. Research continued in Parkinson's and related brain conditions.

The September 2025 update was shorter than usual. Its main subject was a new idea about how FGF-1 works, prompted by findings in another research area.

Background on FGF-1

Dan Montano, the chief executive, recalled that FGF-1 was discovered in the mid-1980s and that Dr. Jack Jacobs, the company's president, was part of the team at Washington University that discovered it. FGF-1 is a molecule that occurs naturally in the human body. Researchers have studied its ability to grow new blood vessels, called angiogenesis, and new nerve cells, called neurogenesis.

He wrote that Zhittya and others had studied FGF-1 in animal models of Parkinson's disease and stroke. Three years earlier the company began dosing people with Parkinson's, and by this point it had dosed more than 200. He said most had shown improvement.

Cellular modulation

Mr. Montano wrote that his reading had led him to the idea of cellular modulation. This is the process by which cells adjust their own activity in response to signals.

He had come to believe that FGF-1 does more than grow blood vessels: that a cell which is not working properly takes FGF-1 inside and uses it to bring its internal functions back toward normal. He presented this as a new understanding for the team. The update reproduced an AI-generated summary of published research on the subject.

Why the brain may need more

He used the idea to explain a puzzle. The team's first calculations for Parkinson's had been off, and in an earlier update he had said it could not account for where most of the FGF-1 went.

His estimate ran as follows. One dose through the nose carries about 3 trillion FGF-1 molecules. Dosing twice a day for six days gives 36 trillion. About 10,000 molecules on a stressed blood vessel cell are thought to be enough to start a new vessel, so 36 trillion would be plenty for that purpose.

But the brain has roughly 100 billion nerve cells and perhaps a trillion supporting cells, called glial cells. Spread across them, 36 trillion comes to only 360 molecules per nerve cell, or 36 per glial cell.

That, he wrote, may explain why the work was taking longer and needing much more FGF-1 than first thought. He also asked whether the brain makes less of its own FGF-1 with age, and whether that plays a part in brain diseases. He posed these as questions, not conclusions.

Other items

The update said the company was setting up a new manufacturing laboratory in Reno, Nevada, and developing new devices for giving FGF-1 through the nose. It said FGF-1 given this way reaches the brain by travelling along nerves such as the olfactory nerve, the nerve for the sense of smell. Research studies in Parkinson's disease, stroke recovery and dementia were continuing, as were the brain imaging studies at Washington University in St. Louis.

This summary covers the Parkinson's research in the September 2025 update. The complete update, including the other topics it covered, is below.