Healthcare is entering a new era: an era driven by the deeper understanding of the people and the communities it serves. As researchers uncover new biological pathways and technologies to make care more personalized and precise, entrepreneurs are working on a range of innovative solutions to address diseases that have long resisted conventional approaches.
From artificial intelligence-driven clinical-support platforms to antibody treatment targeting improved body composition, these Harvard Innovation Labs ventures are advancing breakthroughs across medicine, biotechnology, and public health.
Rethinking How We Treat Autoimmune Diseases
For decades, the standard approach to treating autoimmune and inflammatory disorders has been to suppress the immune system. While these therapies can help control symptoms, they can also leave patients vulnerable to infections. For millions of people living with chronic conditions such as Crohn’s disease, treatment often means managing disease rather than overcoming it.
Promakhos Therapeutics, a $75K winner of the 2026 President’s Innovation Challenge and a current resident of the Pagliuca Harvard Life Lab, is pursuing a different approach. The company is developing oral, non-immunosuppressive small molecules designed to restore the body’s natural ability to resolve inflammation and heal damaged tissue. Rather than broadly shutting down immune activity, its therapies aim to address the underlying biological mechanisms that drive chronic disease.
Bringing Greater Precision to Epilepsy Surgery
For more than one million Americans living with drug-resistant epilepsy, surgery can offer the possibility of seizure freedom. Yet many patients never receive surgical treatment because clinicians cannot confidently identify where seizures originate or determine which areas of the brain can be treated safely. Even when surgery proceeds, the complex networks that drive seizures are often difficult to map, leaving physicians to make high stakes decisions with incomplete information. FIND Neuro, a $25K winner of the 2026 President’s Innovation Challenge and a current Launch Lab X Alumni Accelerator resident, is working to change that. The company has developed a clinical decision-support platform that uses artificial intelligence and brain network analysis to help epilepsy surgeons identify critical seizure-driving regions and make more informed treatment decisions using data already collected in standard clinical care.
As advances in neuroscience continue to reveal that epilepsy is a disorder of interconnected brain networks rather than isolated regions, the need for more precise surgical planning has become increasingly urgent. FIND Neuro’s technology is designed to integrate into existing clinical workflows, providing objective insights without requiring new hardware or additional procedures. By helping clinicians determine where to target treatment, and where to preserve, the company is working to expand access to life-changing surgical interventions for patients who may otherwise run out of options.
Building Belonging Through Mental Health
Young people today are facing unprecedented mental health challenges, yet many struggle to find support that reflects their lived experiences. For students from immigrant and minority backgrounds, barriers such as stigma, cultural expectations, language differences, and feelings of isolation can make it especially difficult to access meaningful care. Nunchi Health, a 2024 Social Impact Fellowship Fund recipient, was founded to address this gap. Through free, peer-led programs, fellowships, leadership training, and campus chapters, the organization is creating spaces where young people can explore mental health, build community, and find support that honours their identities and experiences.
Grounded in the belief that healing happens through connection, Nunchi Health is reimagining what mental health support can look like for a new generation. Its programs are designed by young people, centered on cultural understanding, and built to foster belonging rather than simply reduce symptoms. As conversations around mental health continue to evolve, Nunchi Health demonstrates how community-driven approaches can empower young people to become advocates for their own wellbeing and the wellbeing of others.
Advancing the Next Generation of Obesity Therapies
Obesity affects hundreds of millions of people worldwide and is a major risk factor for conditions ranging from cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes to liver disease and certain cancers. While recent weight-loss medications have transformed the field, many treatments rely primarily on appetite suppression and can result in the loss of both fat and muscle, raising important questions about long-term metabolic health. Overture Therapeutics, a $75K winner of the 2026 President’s Innovation Challenge, is developing a new generation of obesity therapies designed to address these challenges. By targeting emerging biological pathways that drive metabolic dysfunction, the company aims to create treatments that deliver healthier, more sustainable outcomes for patients.
Rather than focusing solely on reducing bodyweight, Overture’s approach is centered on improving body composition and metabolic health. The company is developing precision antibody therapeutics designed to reduce excess fat while preserving lean muscle and targeting the biological mechanisms underlying obesity and its related conditions. As scientific understanding of metabolic disease continues to evolve, Overture Therapeutics represents a broader shift toward therapies that treat obesity as a complex biological disorder rather than simply a matter of appetite or will-power.
Empowering the Next Generation to Prevent Heart Disease
Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of death worldwide, yet many of its most significant risk factors, including poor diet, physical inactivity, obesity, and hypertension, begin developing years before symptoms appear. Despite this reality, efforts to improve heart health have traditionally focused on treatment rather than prevention, often overlooking the role that young people play in shaping healthier communities. The World Youth Heart Foundation is working to change that. By mobilizing individuals under age 35 through education, advocacy, research, entrepreneurship, and technology, the organization is building a global movement focused on preventing cardiovascular disease before it starts.
Founded on the belief that youth are powerful agents of change, the World Youth Heart Foundation equips emerging leaders to develop innovative solutions, advance public awareness, and improve access to cardiovascular care in their communities. Its work brings together students, researchers, clinicians, entrepreneurs, and advocates across disciplines and geographies, creating a collaborative approach to one of the world’s most pressing health challenges. As a global burden of heart disease continues to grow, the organization demonstrates how community-driven innovation can help a healthier future for generations to come.
Expanding the Reach of Modern Medicine Through Targeted Protein Degradation
Many of the proteins that drive chronic disease exist outside cells on their surfaces, placing them beyond the reach of many of today’s most powerful therapeutic technologies. While traditional drugs often work by blocking a protein’s activity, they must leave the underlying disease-causing molecule intact. As a result, numerous biological targets implicated to cancer, autoimmune disorders, and other chronic diseases remain difficult to treat effectively. Transcera, a $75K winner of the 2021 President’s Innovation Challenge, is developing a new approach. By harnessing the body’s natural lipid trafficking pathways, the company is creating therapeutics that can selectively direct extracellular proteins to lysosomes, the cell’s recycling centers, for degradation and removal.
Transcera’s platform combines a proprietary lysosome-targeting lipid, tunable chemical linker, and protein-binding component into a compact, manufacturable molecule capable of degrading both soluble and membrane-bound proteins across diverse tissues and cell types. Rather than simply inhibiting disease-driving proteins, the company’s approach is designed to eliminate them altogether, opening the door to new treatments for conditions driven by abnormal extracellular biology. As targeted protein degradation continues to emerge as one of the most promising frontiers in drug discovery, Transcera is helping extend this model to a vast class of proteins that have historically remained beyond the reach of conventional medicines.
