The yearning to cheat death has infused pop culture for ages, from “The Picture Of Dorian Gray” to “Death Becomes Her” to “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.”
But in recent years, finding the secret to longer life has transitioned from mythical fiction to actual science with the help of over $5 billion in investments from the likes of Peter Thiel, Jeff Bezos and Sam Altman.
This ultra-wealthy cohort is laser-focused on preventing aging at the molecular level, while others are funneling cash into battling more tangible age-related diseases like Parkinson’s.
And while you may have heard of Bezos-backed Altos Labs or Thiel favorite Methuselah, the Singapore-based longevity fund Immortal Dragons is making its own progress on the not dying front — which one would certainly expect from a venture with the tagline “Make Death Optional.”
Enter the dragon
Boyang Wang, the CEO of Immortal Dragons, is only 34, longevity has interested him for years.
Originally from China, he became interested in preventative medicine after a health scare in which he went into anaphylactic shock and fell unconscious for an hour. He later learned that it was due to a buckwheat allergy, and the episode made him contemplate a world in which one could prevent an allergy before it began.
In December 2023, with several successful startups under his belt, he launched Immortal Dragons, funnelling about $4 million from family and friends and $36 million of his own money. The goal is to invest in “moonshot initiatives,” he told The Post, with big risks and big rewards.
For example, one firm doing quite well in the Immortal Dragons portfolio is Frontier Bio, which is developing 3D biofabrication techniques that would allow new organs to be printed instead of relying on donors.
Such an innovation would mediate the years-long waiting lists for organs such as kidneys, livers and hearts in the United States.
Another company that received a $500,000 investment from Immortal Dragons is focused on creating mammals, like monkeys, without fully-developed nervous systems. The idea is that eventually, these beings could be used as more ethical medical research subjects than sentient animals who can think and feel.
Though many would argue that the initiative is bizarre, this question of sentience is why some vegans still eat oysters. When the alternative is testing on animals or humans, designing nonsentient beings sparks a curious moral question — and potentially solves a pressing need.
The fund has also supported is Unlimited Bio, which is testing frontier therapies — including a new clinical trial to evaluate if two gene therapies administered simultaneously could help reduce rates of age-related muscle decline.
An advocacy arm within the organization, meanwhile, plants seeds for future research. For example, Immortal Dragons collaborated with a sponsor to advocate for the New Hampshire “Right to Try” law passed in August 2025, which guaranteed patients with terminal illnesses the right to try experimental therapies at their own discretion. The move opens the state up for more biomedical research to explore therapies and prevention for age-related diseases.
Tackling disease
Several of the fund’s investments go to passion projects.
Andy Tsai, who lives in Palo Alto, watched his grandfather suffer after being diagnosed with both Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. His grandpa was illiterate but very sharp, so seeing his mental degradation left a mark.
“It’s a helpless position to be in,” he said.
When the dust settled after Tsai’s grandfather passed away from neurodegenerative disease, Tsai found the big picture perplexing.
His great-aunts, his grandfathers’ sisters, all lived to be healthy centenarians without the illnesses that killed his grandfather. This prompted a question that Tsai’s been trying to answer since: What goes on in the brain that creates vast differences in longevity, even between siblings?
Now, Tsai is a post-doctoral student at Stanford University studying neurology — and in December, Immortal Dragons announced that it had launched a four-year partnership to fund various research projects including Tsai’s neuroscience work at Stanford.
What is longevity — and can we all have it?
As a field of study, longevity is somewhat opaque because the definition of what that actually means depends on the person.
Though Immortal Dragons’ mission is chasing everlasting life, Tsai characterizes longevity as ensuring people are in the best health they can be for as long as possible, and reducing the amount of unhealthy years before death. Some experts have called this “health span.”
For advocates, longevity research carries universal appeal that can, eventually, help everyone.
But for cynics, such research can reasonably be seen as billionaire pet projects while 44% of Americans struggle to afford health care, 13% can’t afford groceries and half of renters are priced out of housing.
In 2025, one out of five Americans was insured by Medicare, and in 2024, Medicaid was the primary payer for three out of every five nursing home spots.
Across states, about half of all Medicaid spending goes towards caring for the elderly, and six months of poor health is much less intensive than a decade-long decline in terms of the care workforce required, cost and the emotional impact on families.
But the narrative about billionaires and longevity often misses the human element, Tsai said: Wealth doesn’t protect anyone from having loved ones with neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. Research into longevity, no matter who it’s funded by, has undeniable societal benefits when the rubber meets the road.
For example, Tsai’s research is largely centered on understanding longevity mutations, which are common genes found in centenarians’ bodies, to learn more about the genetic biology of people who live long, healthy lives. From there, his goal is to mimic these genetic mutations in younger adults to prevent longevity-related disorders.
Whether one finds longevity research to be superfluous or not, it’s something Americans need to seriously consider for the health of aging families and the control of future taxpayer dollars.
If people are healthier into old age, the need for caregivers, nursing homes and other social infrastructure won’t be as great. The more people that are sick, the greater the burden on the entire system will be.
“I feel like everyone will benefit from this research, especially people between 40 and 60 years old,” Tsai said. “They’re still healthy, and our target right now is interventions with healthy people to make sure they don’t get sick.”
Karen Fischer is an independent writer and reporter. She produces The Gumbo Pot, a weekly Substack featuring independent reportage on education, health, culture, food, infrastructure and energy.
