SCIENCE BEHIND ARPELOS
Putting the pieces
together for patients
Our orgin story
From unanswered questions
to a new kind of platform
Every breakthrough starts with a frustration—and a spark. Ours came from watching too many promising therapies fail, not because the science was wrong, but because something critical was missing.
In early research and pharma work, our founders kept running into the same issue: the data used to evaluate drug candidates was often blind to what actually happens inside a living human body. Even sophisticated models couldn’t explain why a compound would behave so differently in the clinic than it did in vitro. The culprit? Pleiotropy—drugs doing different things in different cells, often unpredictably.
A deeper look into blood
We realized that the most accessible and information-rich source of human biology—blood—was being underused. So we started with a simple idea: what if you could treat fresh human blood like a full-body sensor? By analyzing responses across all major blood cell types in parallel, we could start to see not just what a drug was designed to do, but what it actually does.
A platform built to answer better questions
What began as a proof-of-concept evolved into a robust, scalable platform for capturing complex drug behavior in a format pharma teams can act on. Today, we’re combining single-cell resolution with functional profiling to bring clarity to one of the hardest problems in drug development—how to understand, predict, and design around therapeutic pleiotropism.
Dr. Lina Kovach
Arpelos Founder
“What if we could actually see what a drug is doing—in real human cells, in real time? That simple question still drives everything we do. It challenged us to rethink how we measure and interpret drug activity.”
The people building
a smarter way to study drugs
We’re a team of scientists, engineers, and creatives brought together by a shared belief: that understanding what a drug actually does in the body shouldn’t be a mystery. With backgrounds in immunology, systems biology, machine learning, and biotech R&D, we’re designing tools that make cellular complexity both visible and useful.
Advisory board
Guided by leaders in science, medicine, and biotech
Our advisors bring decades of experience across immunology, translational research, pharma strategy, and company building. Their insight helps us navigate complexity, validate our science, and stay focused on delivering real-world impact.
Investors
Backed by partners who believe in deep science.
We’re proud to be supported by investors who understand the long-term value of rigorous biology, smart platforms, and ambitious teams working at the edge of what’s possible.
Data Collective (DCVC)
Flagship Pioneering
Sofinnova Partners
Polaris Partners
Polaris Partners
8VC
