What is FlyGym Why Drosophila Measures
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FlyGym Platform

An automated platform for brain health therapeutic discovery with high resolution behavioral tracking using Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly)

What is FlyGym?

By combining automation, artificial intelligence, and neuroscience, FlyGym turns the fruit fly into a scalable discovery engine, enabling faster progress toward solving one of society's most urgent challenges: healthy aging.

Using this platform, Juvion screens, discovers, and develops novel compounds to maintain neuromuscular health for its internal pipeline, including Juvion 001.

The platform also supports partners by de-risking target identification and rapidly demonstrating the impact of their compounds on brain health.

FlyGym at a glance

FlyGym at a glance

Why Drosophila?

Biological Relevance

Along with conserved structural and functional features of NMJs, about 75% of genes involved in human neurodegeneration and aging pathways have homologs in fruit flies.

Speed and Scale

A 50-day lifespan enables affordable long term aging studies while capturing whole organism brain function and tissue interactions that cell culture models cannot replicate.

Rich, relevant behavior

Aggression, mating, drunkenness, memory, sociability, sleep, circadian rhythms, neurodegenerative diseases, and many more.

Drosophila by the numbers

14
Nobel Prizes awarded for research using Drosophila
100K+
Publications on Drosophila neuroscience
3
Peer-reviewed Juvion publications validating the platform

Shared biology with humans

Interventions for human diseases being discovered in Drosophila

Disease Drosophila gene / pathway
Alzheimer's diseasetau, Aβ42, App-like (Appl)
Parkinson's diseasePINK1, parkin (park), LRRK2
ALSTBPH (TDP-43), cabeza (FUS)
Huntington's diseasehuntingtin (htt), polyQ expansion
Aging & longevityTrio, InR (insulin receptor), dFOXO
Epilepsypara (SCN1A), eas (KCNQ)
Fragile X syndromedfmr1 (FMR1)

What FlyGym Measures

FlyGym simultaneously quantifies motor performance across key biological dimensions directly relevant to human healthy aging.

Toxicity & Lifespan

Rapid identification of toxic compounds and lifespan effects at scale. Screen thousands of compounds for safety and longevity impact before advancing to costly vertebrate studies — dramatically reducing R&D risk and timeline.

Survival curves — Control vs Life extender vs Toxic compound

Mobility

Automated locomotion tracking and neuromuscular function quantification. Gait, speed, endurance, and grip strength decline are the most predictive biomarkers of aging — measured simultaneously across large fly populations.

Mobility graph

Locomotion metrics — graph coming soon

Humanized Drosophila in vivo

Disease-relevant fly models expressing human genes enable direct translational studies. Test compounds in a genetically humanized context that faithfully recapitulates human neuromuscular pathways and aging phenotypes.

Humanised Drosophila in vivo

Humanised Drosophila in vivo model

Additional Features

Sleep
Circadian Rhythm
Grip Strength
Associative Learning
Neurotransmitter Release
Neurodegeneration
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