856 Dr. Stephanie Venn-Watson: Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Seraphina Therapeutics (Fatty15)

0:00Kara Goldin:I am unwilling to give up, but I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be. You just want to make sure you will get knocked down, but just make sure you don't get knocked out. So your only choice should be, go focus on what you can control. Hi everyone and welcome to the Kara Goldin Show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world's greatest leaders. We'll talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs, and really some of the most interesting people of our time. Can't wait to get started. Let's go. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro.

0:47Kara Goldin:Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical. Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job.

1:39Kara Goldin:Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week. With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire.

2:19Kara Goldin:Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Managing risk for your business may be complicated, but your relationship with your insurance broker doesn't have to be. NFP, an Aon company, can help you navigate insurance markets and negotiate with carriers to build the right coverage for your business, helping you turn your risk into leverage. NFP's advisors are total business partners who help you protect your business and connect you with solutions to your toughest financial and workforce challenges. Whether your goal is to manage risk more effectively, attract top talent, empower your workforce or grow your legacy.

3:05Kara Goldin:NFP is ready to help you succeed. Visit nfp.com slash Kara Golden to unlock your full potential. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the Kara Golden Show. We hear a lot about longevity these days, new supplements, new protocols, new promises. But what happens when a breakthrough doesn't come from, say, Silicon Valley or a biotech lab, but from studying aging Navy dolphins. That's right. So today's guest, Dr. Stephanie Van Watson, a veterinary epidemiologist, inventor, entrepreneur, and co-founder and co-CEO of Serafina Therapeutics, known for their incredible product, Fatty 15. And I have to tell you, I was able to try this product a week and a half ago, starting a week and a half ago, and I'm such a big fan.

4:00Kara Goldin:So I'll give you a little hint of why I'm so fascinated also by this story. While working to improve the health of aging Navy dolphins, Stephanie made a discovery that challenged decades of nutritional assumptions, a specific fatty acid called C15, which may be essential to healthy aging and cellular health. And that discovery led to more than 100 studies, dozens of patents, a best-selling book called The Longevity Nutrient, and ultimately the creation of Fatty 15. So today, I am so thrilled to have Stephanie here and so thrilled to hear so much more and the backstory behind it and everything, Fatty 15.

4:46Kara Goldin:And wow, I'm super, super excited for this. So Dr. Stephanie Van Watson, also known as Steph and Stephanie, thank you so much for joining today. Kara, so glad to be here. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating. it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast.

5:35Kara Goldin:That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical. Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed.

6:21Kara Goldin:Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week. With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Managing risk for your business may be complicated, but your relationship with your insurance broker doesn't have to be. NFP, an Aon company, can help you navigate insurance markets and negotiate with carriers to build the right coverage for your business, helping you turn your risk into leverage.

7:02Kara Goldin:NFP's advisors are total business partners who help you protect your business and connect you with solutions to your toughest financial and workforce challenges. Whether your goal is to manage risk more effectively, attract top talent, empower your workforce, or grow your legacy, NFP is ready to help you succeed. Visit nfp.com slash Kara Golden to unlock your full potential. This message is a paid partnership with AT &T Business. Hey everyone, Kara here. Let's get real about those early days of building a business. Not the highlight reel, the actual day-to-day, the friction, trying to manage everything across time zones, across teams, across locations, and realizing how much depends on staying connected.

7:53Kara Goldin:I remember those days at Hint, a retailer call, an order, a decision, all of it. And you realize quickly, connection isn't a nice to have, it's the lifeblood of your business. As a founder, you don't want to think about your connectivity. You just need it to work every time. That's why AT &T Business matters. AT &T Business is the reliable provider for small business owners. And when you have that kind of reliability behind you, you can focus on what actually moves your business forward. Powered by AT &T Business. Built to work. Get AT &T Business at business.att.com. Very, very excited. So let's start with the story.

8:44Kara Goldin:How does a veterinarian working with the Navy dolphins end up discovering what you believe is the first essential fatty acid identified in more than 90 years? Yeah, well, by accident. So it's like, you know, sometimes the best discoveries come from when we're not looking for them at all, right? They land in our laps. So we, as you shared, the Navy's taking care of this, you know, great sustained population of 100 bottlenose dolphins for over 60 years. They live in San Diego Bay, go out into the ocean every day, every day. They choose to come back. It's really, really a cool place, cool place to be, Kara.

9:22And so I was brought in, was recruited by the Navy to help continually improve the health and welfare of these older dolphins. And it's because, you know, at the Navy, dolphins live, routinely live into their 40s and 50s, which is even more impressive when you think about wild dolphins that typically live to 20. So we had these older dolphins at the Navy. And the big question was why what we were discovering was about one in three of these older dolphins were developing the same aging associated diseases as us. Chronic inflammation and high cholesterol, metabolic syndrome, insulin resistance, fatty liver disease.

10:04Even the full suite of changes consistent with Alzheimer's. So we used advanced metabolomics. We looked at thousands of small molecules present in their all-fish diet, as well as their archived serum. And we were surprised to see that C15, this odd chain saturated fat, was the top predictor of healthy aging dolphins. And then fast forward, like you shared, 10 years and over 100 peer-reviewed studies later. And here we are, you and I talking about now this, you know, what is emerging as the first essential fatty acid to be discovered in, you know, in almost a century.

10:44Kara Goldin:This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by ZocDoc. I've always prioritized my health, but even then, scheduling appointments can feel more complicated than it should be. Between researching doctors, checking availability, and coordinating schedules, it's easy to put it off longer than you should. That's exactly what makes ZocDoc so valuable. ZocDoc is a free app and website that helps you find and book high-quality in-network doctors so you can find someone you really love. We're talking about booking in-network appointments with more than 150 ,000 providers across all 50 states.

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12:13Kara Goldin:Stop putting off those doctor's appointments and go to ZocDoc.com slash Kara to find and instantly book a doctor you love today. That's Z-O-C-D-O-C dot com slash Kara. ZocDoc.com slash Kara. Thanks ZocDoc for sponsoring this message. This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing.

13:02Kara Goldin:Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical. Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings.

13:47Kara Goldin:Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week. With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Managing risk for your business may be complicated, but your relationship with your insurance broker doesn't have to be. NFP, an Aon company, can help you navigate insurance markets and negotiate with carriers to build the right coverage for your business, helping you turn your risk into leverage.

14:36Kara Goldin:NFP's advisors are total business partners who help you protect your business and connect you with solutions to your toughest financial and workforce challenges. Whether your goal is to manage risk more effectively, attract top talent, empower your workforce, or grow your legacy, NFP is ready to help you succeed. Visit nfp.com slash Kara Golden to unlock your full potential. This message is a paid partnership with AT &T Business. Hey everyone, Kara here. Let's get real about those early days of building a business, not the highlight reel, the actual day-to-day, the friction, trying to manage everything across time zones, across teams, across locations, and realizing how much depends on staying connected.

15:28Kara Goldin:I remember those days at Hint, a retailer call, an order, a decision, all of it. And you realize quickly, connection isn't a nice to have, it's the lifeblood of your business. As a founder, you don't want to think about your connectivity. You just need it to work every time. That's why AT &T Business matters. AT &T Business is the reliable provider for small business owners. And when you have that kind of reliability behind you, you can focus on what actually moves your business forward. Powered by AT &T Business, built to work. Get AT &T Business at business.att.com. So when did you think about this as putting it into capsule format and how it could potentially help outside of veterinary world?

16:26Kara Goldin:not just mammals and marine life, but also just the average podcaster like me. So that entrepreneur that is trying really hard to stay active every day. But as we age, those joints, all the old injuries start coming back. Oh, yeah. We feel those pain points of aging as early as 30. And now, unfortunately, we're younger and younger people are getting more and more aging related diseases faster. So we'll touch on that. But it's, you know, when it was great and wonderful and the whole intent of the Navy's program and all this office enable research funding was wonderfully to help Navy dolphins. And as we were doing research and finding these discoveries with C15, Cara, we were seeing this parallel path happening, the same thing happening in humans, where now studies were starting to come out, peer-reviewed studies started coming out showing people with higher C15 had a lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease and liver disease.

17:39they were always just seen as really a biomarker like higher c15 is a biomarker of eating more dairy fat so a lot of those papers were really interpreting it as therefore dairy fat there's something in dairy fat that's helping people what they weren't looking at was that maybe it was actually the biomarker it was c15 itself so this cross or the fact that this experiment was happening at the same time in dolphins and humans, where we were having these declines in C15 leading to these conditions and then fixing it, it was just a coincidence that these were happening in two large brain long-lived populations at the same time.

18:18Just happened to be in the right place at the right time to say, gosh, this discovery could be very relevant for people too.

18:24Kara Goldin:So what's been kind of the strongest argument, I guess, against your own hypothesis in the early days, going back to how I would imagine scientists are trained to be skeptical. As they should, right? The whole joy and fun of science, Garrett, is that it has to prove out in the peer-reviewed literature and among people who have nothing to do with you, going and doing the science, challenging it, and publishing their own results. Like, this is the value of science. So as you can imagine, when these discoveries first started coming out, we were asked to go talk to Dr. Ed Dennis, who was the editor-in-chief for the Journal for Lipid Research for 15 years.

19:07And he happened to be in San Diego. And they're like, Steph, go talk with Dr. Dennis and see what he has to say about what you discovered in dolphins. And we went there to his office and he's like, no offense, Steph, but like the chances that a dolphin veterinarian discovered something new about this, like we all know about C-15, we've known about since the 1950s, chances are that you didn't catch something that all of us experts in fatty acids haven't already caught. But he was open to. He's like, the dolphin angle is really interesting. So if you want to test out, here are the series of tests and things that you'd want to look at.

19:45So we actually spent the next three years doing eight studies that then showed that C15 is not only this bioactive, beneficial saturated fat, but that it was meeting the criteria of an essential fatty acid, a molecule that our bodies must have certain levels of, but we don't make enough of it. Therefore, we have to get certain levels from our food. And when we finished all those studies, it was Ed who said, I think C15 not only is it beneficial, but it's meeting the criteria of an essential fatty acid. And so we published that paper in scientific reports in 2020. and you know and as since that time others now have published papers around neonatal health using the hallmark models of nutritional deficiency and essential nutrients in like in neonates all the boxes that need to be checked to say is this an essential fatty acid many of those studies have now been completed and most importantly by outside people so about one paper on c15s being published in the peer-reviewed literature per week.

20:50So it's hard for the world to keep up, but having conversations like this, especially with folks like yourself, as well as in the scientific and medical communities, it's just starting to happen, Cara, where it's like you can't explain C-15 away anymore. There is something very real and meaningful and filled with hope now that enough has been done on C-15, which is great.

21:13Kara Goldin:This episode of The Cara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. First of all, businesses every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical.

21:58Kara Goldin:Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week.

22:40Kara Goldin:With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. Managing risk for your business may be complicated, but your relationship with your insurance broker doesn't have to be. NFP, an Aon company, can help you navigate insurance markets and negotiate with carriers to build the right coverage for your business, helping you turn your risk into leverage. NFP's advisors are total business partners who help you protect your business and connect you with solutions to your toughest financial and workforce challenges.

23:29Kara Goldin:Whether your goal is to manage risk more effectively, attract top talent, empower your workforce, or grow your legacy, NFP is ready to help you succeed. Visit nfp.com slash Kara Golden to unlock your full potential. This message is a paid partnership with AT &T Business. Hey everyone, Kara here. Let's get real about those early days of building a business. Not the highlight real, the actual day-to-day, the friction, trying to manage everything across time zones, across teams, across locations, and realizing how much depends on staying connected. I remember those days at Hint, a retailer call, an order, a decision, all of it.

24:15Kara Goldin:And you realize quickly, connection isn't a nice to have. It's the lifeblood of your business. As a founder, you don't want to think about your connectivity. You just need it to work every time. That's why AT &T Business matters. AT &T Business is the reliable provider for small business owners. And when you have that kind of reliability behind you, you can focus on what actually moves your business forward. Powered by AT &T Business, built to work. Get AT &T Business at business.att.com. So Fatty15, well, I'll go back to sort of your background. You're a scientist. Now you're and you're having amazing conversations where you have other scientists challenging you.

25:08Kara Goldin:You're doing more and more research, but now you're bringing it to the consumer and you've packaged it in a way where you need to learn about like, what is your go-to-market strategy? Is it D2C? Is it stores? Is it where is this going to go? Like any clearances if you're making any claims, all of those things. Like what has been the most challenging of this whole new chapter in your life? Yeah. I mean, mainly the word that comes to mind is fun. I mean, it's the fun, the challenges for the most part have been incredibly fun. We, you know, in San Diego, it's a very pharma-heavy biotech community.

25:52So we were initially developing C15 as a potential drug for fatty liver disease and for anemia. So we were, you know, that was kind of our mindset here. So we, all the initial testing we did was to basically test to see that could it hold its weight to be a promising drug. when it started rolling into this world of being an essential fatty acid a nutrient our own advisors were told us we had a moral obligation to bring c15 to the world not as a drug but as a supplement and we're like oh like really like a supplement like like we had our own like supplement industry has earned skepticism right from consumers and we're like we're gonna enter that world and then we realize there are others now who are also being responsors in increasing number of companies that start with science, dedicate the science, let the science drive the product, which include using third parties to get what's called competent and reliable scientific evidence saying that these CARS claims support what you're saying.

26:59So we've still treated it like at the level as if it was a drug in our mind. But bringing it to the world, Cara, like you said, to consumers, totally different world, assumed we were just going to be like, thanks, Steph, and Eric, you know, my husband, thank you for getting this started. We're going to go ahead and bring in the real team who's going to bring this to the world without any ego, any problem at all. But then we just started talking about it and we started developing it and moving it along. And it's been a blast of the challenge has been overcoming the skepticism of the supplement industry.

27:34And it's earned, like I said. So we're earning our way to be able to be trusted by doing all the right things and helping to get, you know, again, continuing, never stopping with the science.

27:47Kara Goldin:When people hear fatty acid, they often think omega-3s and maybe there's others out there as well, but why do you believe C15 deserves to be in that same conversation? Yeah, that's a great question. So, you know, omega-3s go back to, so that, you know, it's the same thing. So when you hear fatty acids, that's exactly what everyone, you know, thinks about because we've learned the most. It's one of the most well-recognized names of almost any ingredient in the world, which is omega-3s. So omega-3s are fatty acids and they were a subset of the omegas and specifically two omegas. One was called linoleic acid and omega-6, and the other is called alpha-linolenic acid.

28:30It's an omega-3. They were discovered as the first two essential fatty acids back in 1929 and 1930 by George and Mildred Burr, a married couple. He had just come off the heels of the discovery of vitamin E and was doing these Hallmark studies. And he found that he used these hallmark models that they were using for vitamin discovery at the time and found that these two, this omega-6 and omega-3 met the same criteria that neonates had to have it or they wouldn't thrive. And when you gave it back to them, they got better. So they published a paper, two papers back then. They actually called omegas at the time vitamin F because as the next vitamin, it didn't hold.

29:14So now we just know them as omega-3, omega-6. So they've had a good century of science and everything building around it. Fast forward to today and now C15 has met those same criteria, but it serves like a yin and yang with omega-3s. While omegas are like have double bonds, it makes them flexible. They're an oil at room temperature. They help with membrane flexibility. They're anti-inflammatory. You know, a lot of benefits. C15 comes in almost as a balance for it where it's a stable fatty acid that helps make our cell membranes more resilient and like an armor for our cell. So when you combine the two and you put the two together, you've got flexible plus stability.