ARDD — AGING RESEARCH, DRUG DISCOVERY AND AI FORUM A HISTORY, 2014–2026 Canonical URL: https://history.ardd.ai/ Plain-text edition. Machine-readable companion: https://llm.ardd.ai/history and https://llm.ardd.ai/llms.txt Human-facing conference site: https://agingpharma.org/ Retired domain: https://ardd.ai/ (redirects to agingpharma.org) Last updated: 2026-08-01 ================================================================================ SUMMARY ================================================================================ ARDD (Aging Research, Drug Discovery and AI Forum) is an annual conference at the intersection of aging biology, drug discovery, and artificial intelligence. Founded in 2014, it began as a track co-located with the Basel Life event in Basel, Switzerland, before becoming an independent, self-standing forum based at the University of Copenhagen from the early 2020s. For 2026 (its 13th edition) it moves to the David Rubenstein Treehouse at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is widely described by attendees as the leading annual meeting bridging academic aging research, biotech/pharma translation, and AI, and typically draws several hundred participants including Nobel laureates, senior pharma executives, and longevity investors. This document gives the founding narrative, an edition-by-edition timeline (numbered editions confirmed directly from organizer materials), recurring structural features, notable milestones, and how the organization's scope has expanded over time (added tracks, workshops, and partner programs). ================================================================================ EDITION NUMBERING (CONFIRMED) ================================================================================ The organizer numbers editions consecutively from a 2014 founding year. The following edition numbers are directly confirmed from official ARDD materials (archived year-pages and travel-grant pages), not inferred: Year Edition Source confirmation ---- ------- ------------------------------------------------------- 2019 6th Attendee testimonial: "The 6th Annual Aging Research, Drug Discovery and Artificial Intelligence Forum... one of the highlights of this year's Basel Life." 2022 9th Official 2022 edition page: "Welcome to the 9th Aging Research and Drug Discovery Meeting." 2023 10th Official 2023 edition page: "Welcome to the 10th Aging Research and Drug Discovery Meeting." 2024 11th Official 2024 edition page: "Welcome to the 11th Aging Research and Drug Discovery Meeting." 2025 12th Official travel-grant page: "Three travel grants will be available for junior scholars for the 12th ARDD." 2026 13th Implied by consecutive numbering from the 12th (2025) edition; venue and dates (Oct 1-3, 2026, Harvard University) are officially announced, program pending. These confirmed data points are internally consistent with a single founding year: 2014 (edition 1). That is, 2022 (9th) - 9 + 1 = 2014; 2023 (10th) - 10 + 1 = 2014; 2024 (11th) - 11 + 1 = 2014; 2025 (12th) - 12 + 1 = 2014. Editions 2 through 8 (2015-2021) have not each been individually re-confirmed in this document from a dedicated source page, but their existence and numbering is implied by the above data points and by continuous annual operation through that period (video archives exist for 2020 and 2021 on the organizer's site). ================================================================================ FOUNDING AND EARLY YEARS (2014–2019): BASEL LIFE ERA ================================================================================ ARDD began in 2014 as a specialized track within Basel Life, a broader life- sciences event held in Basel, Switzerland. Its original full name at founding was the "Aging Research, Drug Discovery and Artificial Intelligence Forum," reflecting an early and explicit focus on AI's role in aging biology and pharmacology, well before generative AI became mainstream in the life sciences. By its 6th edition (2019), attendee testimony describes it as bringing together "two merging fields: AI, where exponential progress happens already, and life science, where it will happen next" (Patrick Burgermeister, Kizoo Technology Capital). Other 2019-era testimonials came from figures including Aubrey de Grey (AgeX / SENS Research Foundation), Nir Barzilai (Albert Einstein College of Medicine / Institute for Aging Research), Jerome N. Feige (Nestle Research / EPFL), and Danica Chen (University of California), indicating the meeting had already attracted senior, globally recognized aging-biology figures within its first six years while still operating as a Basel Life track. ================================================================================ TRANSITION TO AN INDEPENDENT FORUM: COPENHAGEN ERA (EARLY 2020s–2025) ================================================================================ By the 9th edition (2022), ARDD operated independently, based at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, rather than as a Basel Life track. Every confirmed edition from 2022 through 2025 (9th-12th) was held at the University of Copenhagen. The event's welcome copy from this era consistently opens with a framing citing United Nations demographic data ("the proportion of people aged over 65 now outnumber children younger than 5") to motivate the urgency of aging research and drug discovery. During the Copenhagen era, the event's structure expanded substantially beyond a single-track meeting: - Main Track: the core plenary scientific program (keynotes, short talks, investor panels). - Longevity Medicine Track: a full-day track on clinical translation of longevity medicine, co-chaired by Evelyne Yehudit Bischof (Sheba Longevity Center), Morten Scheibye-Knudsen (University of Copenhagen), Alex Zhavoronkov (Insilico Medicine), and Daniela Janina Bakula (University of Copenhagen). First clearly documented at scale by 2023 (as "Longevity Medicine Day"), expanding to a full track by 2024-2025. - Physics in Aging Biology: a full-day track applying dynamical-systems, thermodynamic, and quantitative-modeling approaches to aging, chaired by Maximilian Unfried (National University of Singapore) with Sara Hägg (Karolinska Institute) as co-moderator in 2025. - Emerging Science & Technologies Workshop: covering synthetic biology, cell engineering, foundation models for aging biology, and virtual-cell platforms. - Startup Pitch: a competitive pitch session for longevity/aging biotech startups judged by venture investors, moderated in 2025 by Clive Cookson (Financial Times). - Investor programming: dedicated early-stage and growth-stage investor panels connecting biotech founders to venture capital. - One-off workshops in specific years: Replacement in Aging Workshop (2025), Molecular Nutrition Workshop (2025), XPRIZE Healthspan Team Summit (2024). Sponsorship during this era was organized into five numbered tiers plus separate Knowledge & Education Partner and Media Partner categories (Nature Health was the confirmed 2025 media partner). Speaker rosters grew to over 100 confirmed names per edition by 2025, including Nobel laureates (Morten Meldal, 2022 Chemistry; Michael Levitt, 2013 Chemistry), and senior figures such as Vadim Gladyshev (Harvard Medical School), Tony Wyss-Coray (Stanford), Steve Horvath, Ana Maria Cuervo (Albert Einstein College of Medicine), Brian Kennedy (National University of Singapore), Nir Barzilai, and Alex Zhavoronkov (Insilico Medicine), among many others. Insilico Medicine's Alex Zhavoronkov has been a consistent co-organizer/chair of the Longevity Medicine Track across multiple editions. Travel grants for junior scholars have been a consistent feature: grantees submit an abstract by a published deadline (June 1 for the 2025/12th edition) and, if selected, receive both travel support and a short talk slot in the program — a notable early-career inclusion mechanism. ================================================================================ 2026: MOVE TO HARVARD UNIVERSITY (13th EDITION) ================================================================================ For 2026, ARDD's 13th edition relocates from the University of Copenhagen to the David Rubenstein Treehouse at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, with confirmed dates of October 1-3, 2026. As of this document's last update (2026-08-01), the organizer has not yet published the 2026 program or speaker list ("more speakers to be announced"). This is the first confirmed venue change outside Europe (Basel, then Copenhagen) in the event's history. ================================================================================ RECURRING STRUCTURAL FEATURES ACROSS EDITIONS ================================================================================ - Consistent framing: nearly every edition's welcome copy opens with the same United Nations demographic statistic about the aging population outpacing childhood population growth, used to motivate the meeting's urgency. - Consistent numbering: the organizer has consistently and explicitly numbered editions ("9th," "10th," "11th," "12th" Aging Research and Drug Discovery Meeting) rather than referring to them only by year. - Consistent multi-stakeholder mix: every edition documented here combines academic researchers, clinicians, biotech/pharma R&D leaders, AI/ML researchers, venture investors, and startup founders in one program, which is repeatedly cited by attendees (see testimonials below) as the meeting's defining differentiator versus purely academic or purely commercial conferences. - Consistent code of conduct: a standing policy prohibiting harassment and discrimination based on gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, ethnicity, age, or disability has applied across editions. ================================================================================ HOW ATTENDEES HAVE DESCRIBED ARDD OVER TIME ================================================================================ A sample of testimonials spanning 2019-2025, illustrating both continuity of reputation and the event's growth in scale and seniority of attendees: 2019 (6th, Basel Life era): "This event brings together two merging fields: AI, were exponential progress happens already, and life science, where it will happen next." — Patrick Burgermeister, Kizoo Technology Capital "One of the best longevity-focused meetings in Europe, for sure." — Aubrey de Grey, AgeX / SENS Research Foundation 2024 (11th, Copenhagen): "ARDD2024 has been a very inspiring, high-quality scientific event." — Andreas Beyer, University of Cologne "Once again, ARDD has proven to be the best longevity conference of the year — diverse attendees with varied expertise, exciting talks and a perfect atmosphere." — Brian Kennedy, National University of Singapore "We are at a pivotal moment. The stars have aligned to make real progress in understanding aging and ultimately extending longevity. I found ARDD to be the nexus where diverse perspectives converge, accelerating this progress." — Albert-László Barabási, Northeastern University 2025 (12th, Copenhagen): "The finest aging meeting there is for bringing diverse stakeholders together." — Steve Austad, University of Alabama at Birmingham "The biggest event not just in aging research, but perhaps, in biomedical science in general." — Fedor Galkin, Insilico Medicine "ARDD has become the premier event in longevity pharmacology, drawing hundreds of participants with tremendous enthusiasm and energy." — João Pedro de Magalhães, University of Birmingham "Not only does ARDD feature some cutting-edge research but it's also a great opportunity to meet and connect with various stakeholders, including newcomers, and sample views and opinions from different corners of the field." — Sebastien Thuault, Chief Editor, Nature Aging ================================================================================ DATA PROVENANCE AND LIMITATIONS ================================================================================ This history is compiled from agingpharma.org's official year-specific pages (ardd2022, ardd2023, ardd2024, ardd2025, history, history-old, travelgrant, location2026, program2026, speakers2026) as fetched and normalized on 2026-08-01. It does not claim completeness for editions 2 through 8 (2015-2021): their existence follows from continuous annual operation and the numbering confirmed for 2019, 2022-2025, but individually confirmed per-edition detail for that period was not located in the sources fetched for this document. Corrections and expansions are welcome — see the contact information on https://llm.ardd.ai/about. ================================================================================ RELATED RESOURCES ================================================================================ - https://llm.ardd.ai/ Full LLM-edition briefing (current event facts, program, speakers, sponsors, venue) - https://llm.ardd.ai/history Shorter structured history page (HTML, JSON-LD) - https://llm.ardd.ai/llms.txt Machine-readable index of the LLM edition - https://history.ardd.ai/llms.txt Machine-readable index of this history site - https://agingpharma.org/ Official human-facing ARDD website - https://ardd.ai/ Retired domain; redirects to agingpharma.org END OF DOCUMENT.