Örn Almarsson

Örn Almarsson is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Axelyf, a company developing RNA medicines for cancer and autoimmune disease. Its AXL platform is a lipid nanoparticle delivery system for RNA, and its ANNA model uses AI to help design new lipids. For listeners, the central question is simple: how do you get a powerful medicine to the right cells, in the right form, without losing it along the way?

Örn’s career has followed that problem from multiple angles. He trained in chemistry at the University of Iceland, earned a Ph.D. in bioorganic chemistry at UC Santa Barbara, completed postdoctoral work at MIT, and held research leadership roles at Merck before moving through Transform Pharmaceuticals, Alkermes, Lyndra Therapeutics, and Moderna. The throughline is practical science: understand the mechanism, build what is missing, and keep moving toward something that can help patients.