Veterinary epidemiologist and Seraphina Therapeutics Co-CEO, Stephanie Venn-Watson, reveals how studying dolphins led to the discovery of C15—a breakthrough nutrient redefining healthy aging.
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Show Notes:
In this episode of Mission Matters, Adam Torres speaks with Dr. Stephanie Venn-Watson, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Seraphina Therapeutics, about her fascinating journey from marine mammal research to human longevity science. Stephanie explains how her work with Navy dolphins led to the discovery of C15, the first essential fatty acid identified in nearly a century, and how it’s transforming the way we approach cellular health through Fatty15.
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Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to mission matters.com and click on Be Our Guest to Apply. All right, so today I am in Los Angeles, California. Let me tell you, I’m over out here supporting Elias and his Health Span Summit. Absolutely amazing. I went to this last year. It was big. This year it is even bigger. And my next guest on the show is Stephanie. Stephanie, welcome to the show. Hi Adam. Great to see you. Alright, so, um, first off, health Span Summit Connection to Elias, the conference. How’d that all come about for you? Oh my gosh. We’re all like a. One degree or two degrees separated from Elias? I think so. Um, health Span Summit, uh, helped. I’ve worked with dolphins, ended up learning about health span and how do we expand the span, health span of not only, uh, humans, but of other long-lived species. Uh, made the discovery. Wrote a book called The Longevity Nutrient. Met Elias, and the rest is, is history. So here to educate the masses. So, so what brings you out here today? What are you, what are you promoting specifically? So, I’m giving a talk, uh, today, uh, on longevity and specifically on a new, uh, discovered beneficial nutrient called C 15 and it’s packaged in a supplement called Fatty 15. And so C 15 is the first essential fatty acid to be discovered in over 90 years. Adam, wow. Thanks to dolphins. Let’s go further into that. So, um, the, the folks at home, by the time this comes out in the next five, 10 days, they’re not gonna hear your talk. Tell me more about this fatty 15. And I was telling you before this, when you said we’re talking about fatties, I was like, I just got off a plane from Singapore. Were you talking about me? I thought you were joking about me at first. So, the. No, we’re in fact we’re evangelizing the, uh, the name fatty Adam, as in there are good fats. Uh, okay. So I am a veterinary epidemiologist, was working with the Navy’s marine mammal program. Mm-hmm. Helping to continually improve the health and welfare of navy dolphins. Mm-hmm. Uh, dolphins at the Navy get a lot older than dolphins in the wild, like in the wild. Interesting. Yeah. In the wild Dolphins lived about 20 at the Navy. Uh, dolphins are living in their. Forties and fifties at ’em. Wow. We have two dolphins this year, turning 60 years old. Wow. So we found that about, so hold on real quick about this. Are, are these, do, I don’t know if this sounds good or not, but their quality of life, are they still feeling good? Are they moving, like, how do you say that in dolphins speak? I know like older people, you’re like, are they still mobile? Do they walk around? So for dolphins, they have to swim to like breathe. So obviously they’re still swimming. Exactly. Yeah. So they live in San Diego Bay, go out into the open ocean every day. Every day they choose to come back. So they have a really good exercise regimen. Dang, you know, better than us humans, I think. And so, and they do better, right? As keep ’em working kind of like us, you know, they, and they stay happy. So, uh, we found that about one in three older dolphins were developing diseases that sound familiar, right? Aging associated conditions like chronic inflammation, high cholesterol, even the full suite of changes with Alzheimer’s disease and fatty liver disease. So we were able to use this advanced technology called metabolomics to understand which small molecules predicted the healthiest aging dolphins. Hmm. We looked in their archive serum, but we also looked in their all fish diet. ’cause all they eat are fish. Wow. So what we found was that, um, the, the molecule that was the top predictor of healthy aging dolphins was this fatty acid called C 15 or pento acid. Uh, the dolphins were getting their C 15 from certain types of fish. Primary source is C 15. Are you ready for this? What? Butter Fat. So butter. Butter, fat. Yeah. I don’t eat butter. I know. So. Oh, no, that’s right. So a lot of people, so I’ve been missing the, no, I don’t. I don’t necessarily like it. And if it’s in a food, okay, great. Right, but like, okay, come on. Tell me more. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, so what’s happened with us? So we now know that C 15 is this beneficial fatty acid. We’ve worked with the world’s experts, fast forward 10 years and a hundred peer reviewed papers since that discovery. And we now know that C 15 plays a critical role in strengthening our cell membranes. The opposite Naval research, um, helped us to develop this pure C 15 yeah, uh, ingredient to be able to. Replenish our C 15 supply because you’re not alone. A lot of people now are avoiding dairy fat. And so as a reason, uh, as a result, population-wide, our C 15 levels have been declining, resulting in a proposed new nutritional deficiency syndrome. Mm, called cellular fragility syndrome. So, so as we take this, so talk to me about like the, the hope or as we take this new supplement is, do I call it a supplement? It’s a supplement, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Like tell me more about how that piece of it works. So we launched Fatty 15 in 2021. Uh, and it was sold out within three weeks or six weeks. So people knew, like already kind of knew that they were deficient or how did that happen? How did that happen? I think, to be honest, the name of the supplement became, uh, intriguing, right? So we’re, they see a supplement called Fatty 15. Words started getting out as far as the supplement people were seeing. Um, uh, you know, were experiencing benefits. Strong science, 10 years of science. Again, a hundred peer reviewed papers. Yeah. To um, and so now today, fast forward, today, we have over a hundred thousand active customers. We were just named the fastest growing number one fastest growing supplement company in America by Ink 5,000. What do you attribute that to? Like is it, is part of that the, I obviously part of it’s the product, but there’s gotta be a part about your team. There’s gotta be some other pieces to that because, uh, or am I wrong? I don’t know. Yeah, I mean it’s a mix of The core thing, Adam, is that science works. Yeah. So when, um, we knew with regard to the science that its role is to strengthen our cell membranes against age related breakdown mm-hmm. It’s. Core evolutionary enabler of healthy aging. Yeah. Which we all want. And so people in the long term see like lower cholesterol, improved rib, blood cell, um, health improved, uh, glucose of injury. But what we didn’t know and what the dolphins couldn’t tell us is that, uh, that, uh, people are experiencing improved sleep, calmer mood. Oh, uh, less joint pain. 50% of our customers feel benefits within two weeks. Wow. 70% within 16 weeks. Mm-hmm. So it works, it’s sticky. People then tell their friends, they continue to read the science and uh, and resulting in what we have today. So we’re really, you know, it’s huge gift from the dolphins, from the Navy. Interesting. So what, what are the plans for the company going forward? Like, talk to me about that. Right. So our goal, um, since we began as our whole team was, uh, we were gifted with this incredible, you know, once in a century discovery. So the science continues. So it was about credibility, so build the science, and now the world is building the science with us. The second is, um, was ex, uh, awareness. Yeah, chatting with you here is a, a piece of that. So more and more people know about. Fatty 15 about C 15. So our last pillar is accessibility. So we’re helping to bring C 15 out, um, into the world as an ingredient. We’re understanding, um, the importance of C 15 and infant formulas, um, and food and beverage fortification. So kind of like how you think of omega threes. Yeah. This is a whole new. Nutrient, um, discovered that we all need. So how to get it out to the world is, is our next step. I wanna circle back to your talk today, um, that you’re gonna, so as you present this to the world and it’s a new concept, people, what’s your hook? Like, how do you keep ’em like engaged and it comes to a talk or otherwise, like what’s your gonna be your hook today? Right. Well. We’ve got the dolphin card. So, uh, dolphins ever loves dolphins, so I know that’s, yeah. Yeah. It’s not like people leave the room ’cause they hear that we’re helping dolphins. Uh, so the dolphin part, but the other is that we are all invested in aging healthier. One of the top reasons why people are, uh, buy supplements, why they right. Is to be able to age healthier. So what, um, I’m talking about today is what is the core role of C 15? Literally as the longevity nutrient, not a, but the longevity nutrient. So we help walk through how does it meet the criteria of Yeah. Uh, top um, longevity nutrient and all the science behind it. So it’s, it’s a lot of fun, again, building that credibility. Yeah. And then, uh, giving people the, the confidence to be able to give a try. Amazing. Has anything surprised you along this journey of discovering fatty 15 of the dolphins of your work? Like of. Whether it’s the comp, the rollout of the company, the selling out, has it what surprised you along the way? All of it, even the discovery? Did you know that you were gonna be in this kind of business? Like Yeah, I mean, uh, I previously, I worked for World Health Organization. Yeah, yeah. Uh, and so, uh, being able to, you know, have this discovery made while helping, you know, older dolphins, uh, I don’t even know how to swim. Uh, I’m terrified of water. Wow. So all of this. I don’t know if you’re the best Dolphin representative. No offense. No, not at all. Right? That means it was a true, a true surprise, Adam. So all of this has been, it’s been an incredible journey. To be able to see the benefits, uh, and to see it across all age groups. Hmm. Um, uh, has been, has been just incredible. Amazing. Well, Stephanie, I know you have to get back. Go back out there. I think they’re gonna be calling you up for your talk pretty soon. So that being said, um, last thing I want you to do, look into the camera. If somebody wants to follow up, they wanna learn more, they wanna connect, how do they do that? Yeah, so you can find [email protected], uh, and that’s where you can find all the ways to reach out to us, connect to us on social. And uh, and be able to understand the product. Thank and C 15. Perfect. And for everybody watching, just so you know, we’ll definitely put some links in the show notes, so you can just click on the links and head right on over. And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time with Mission Matters and you haven’t done it yet, hit that subscribe or follow button. This is a daily show. Each and every day we’re bringing you new content, new ideas, and hopefully new inspiration to help you along the way in your journey as well. So again, hit that subscribe or follow button. And Stephanie, thank you so much for coming to the show. It’s been a pleasure. Out of, it’s been wonderful being here with you.
