Kian Sadeghi

He grew up in Brooklyn, New York City. In March 2025, on Terra’s Iron Foundry podcast, he said that both of his parents are Persian and escaped Iran during the 1979 revolution to come to the United StatesUnited StatesThe United States is a federal country in North America made up of 50 states, the District of Columbia as the seat of government, and territories such as Puerto Rico and Guam; its capital is Washington, D.C. The Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The 2020 census (April 1, 2020) counted a resident population of 331,449,281, and the 435 seats of the House of Representatives are apportioned among the states on the basis of the census.Open the full entry; he said that his father had spoken out against the Iranian government and that “the government tried to basically murder my dad,” and that in America his father first flipped hamburgers at McDonald’sMcDonald’sMcDonald’s is a publicly traded restaurant company headquartered in Chicago, known for hamburgers, fries, drive-thrus and its franchise network. Its origins lie in the restaurant opened by Richard and Maurice McDonald in 1940; Ray Kroc expanded franchising from 1955. It operates across more than 100 countries, with the great majority of restaurants run by independent operators.Open the full entry and later became a doctor.⁠[1][2]

In another Iron Foundry episode in August of that year, he described himself as a “first generation American” and said that his father was forced out of Iran for speaking against the government, worked at McDonald’s and later became an ophthalmologist. In the March episode he described himself as born “with the determination of an immigrant with the opportunity of America.”⁠[2][1]

As a child he lost a teenage cousin, who died in her sleep. Freethink wrote in 2024 that he was five at the time and that doctors later suspected she had had long QT syndrome, a rare cardiac disorder that is usually genetic; in a March 2025 podcast he said that doctors attributed her death to long QT syndrome. In an August 2025 podcast he said that he was “almost seven years old” when it happened, that his parents only said “bad genetics,” and that “it just didn't make sense to me.” TechCrunchTechCrunchTechCrunch is an American technology news outlet founded in 2005 by Michael Arrington and Keith Teare and headquartered in San Francisco; it mainly covers technology companies, startups, and venture capital, and hosts events such as TechCrunch Disrupt. Its ownership passed successively through AOL, Verizon, and Yahoo, and in 2025 Regent announced its acquisition.Open the full entry wrote in 2021 that he traces his motivation to his cousin’s premature death from long QT syndrome, which is sometimes genetically linked; its 2025 article states that she died of a previously unknown genetic condition; and CBS NewsCBS NewsCBS News is the news organization of the U.S. CBS system, part of Paramount, providing news coverage through television, the web and streaming. Its history extends from radio newsgathering to television and digital platforms; its signature programs include CBS Evening News, 60 Minutes and Face the Nation, and CBS News 24/7 is its streaming news service.Open the full entry wrote in 2025 that she died of a rare genetic illness.⁠[3][1][2][4][5][6]

TechCrunch wrote in 2021 that he had experimented with genes at Genspace, a community biology laboratory in Brooklyn, and had appeared in a story in The Wall Street JournalThe Wall Street JournalThe Wall Street Journal is a U.S. news publication founded in 1889, with a focus on business, finance and economics. It is published by Dow Jones, part of News Corp.Open the full entry about do-it-yourself CRISPR enthusiasts.⁠[4]

In a March 2025 podcast he said that he joined one of the first do-it-yourself gene-editing laboratories in the country, adding: “I was 17, I think, when the Wall Street Journal article came out about this.” In the August episode he described it as a do-it-yourself genome laboratory on the second floor of a warehouse in Brooklyn, dated it to around 2017, and said that he worked there on engineering yeast and bacteria.⁠[1][2]

He enrolled at the University of PennsylvaniaUniversity of PennsylvaniaThe University of Pennsylvania, commonly called Penn, is a private research university and Ivy League member in Philadelphia. It traces its origins to a 1740 charity-school project; Benjamin Franklin proposed his academy in 1749, classes began in 1751, and a 1791 merger established the institution under its present name. Penn has 12 schools, with undergraduate education concentrated in arts and sciences, engineering, nursing and Wharton. Enrollment totaled 29,384 in fall 2025, and the fiscal 2025 endowment was $24.81 billion. As of October 2026, J. Larry Jameson was president, with his term scheduled to end on June 30, 2027.Open the full entry as an undergraduate in computational biology; in an August 2025 podcast he said that he was at Penn for about a year and a half. Freethink wrote that in a BIOL 221 class a professor showed a chart of the falling cost of whole-genome sequencing, which started at $1 billion and had reached $1,000 by then, in 2020; he concluded that the price “is gonna converge on zero” and that every person in the country would be able to benefit from the entirety of their DNA, and said: “With that in mind, I dropped out of school, moved back into my bedroom in Brooklyn, and I started building.” In the August podcast he said that the chart was shown in that genetics class by the chairman of the biology department.⁠[3][2]

TechCrunch wrote in 2021 that during the COVID-19 lockdowns of 2020, like many of his classmates at the University of Pennsylvania, he was holed up in his bedroom, at home in Brooklyn, where he filled eight spiral notebooks with research on genetic sequencing, computer science and statistics, then dropped out of Penn to work on Nucleus full time. In an August 2025 podcast he said instead that he “filled in 18 subject notebooks,” and that he was “fanatically obsessed with this problem” for a year. The Fitt Insider episode description states that he dropped out of UPenn in 2021.⁠[4][2][7]

He recalled that when he left school he did not tell his parents the truth but said he was working for a professor at Penn, which he called “complete nonsense,” adding: “Let's just say you don't tell Persian parents that you're leaving Penn.” In the August episode he said that his parents were unenthusiastic and had threatened: “we're gonna kick you out of the home.”⁠[1][2]

CBS News wrote in December 2025 that he founded Nucleus Genomics in 2021; Fortune described Nucleus in March 2025 as a five-year-old startup; and Axios wrote in October 2025 that he was 20 when he founded the company.⁠[6][8][9]

His accounts of the first investment differ between two podcast episodes: in March 2025 he said that he found an angel investor’s phone number online and that the investor “ended up coming in, putting in $100,000”; in August he said that he received a text message reading “we want to give you $200,000,” and that he was “genuinely euphoric.” In the August episode he said that in the seed round they pitched 40 investors, all of whom said no, and that the last firm they pitched was Founders FundFounders FundFounders Fund is a venture capital firm founded in San Francisco in 2005 by Peter Thiel and his former PayPal colleagues Ken Howery and Luke Nosek. Run by partners who were entrepreneurs themselves, it argues that founders should keep more control and is known for betting on difficult technology projects in areas such as space, defense, and artificial intelligence. It was Palantir’s first institutional investor, has invested in SpaceX many times since 2008, and its other notable investments include Facebook, Airbnb, Stripe, and Anduril; as of March 2026 it had raised nine early-stage funds and four growth funds.Open the full entry; in both episodes he recalled that Founders Fund offered to invest $1.5 million, which in the March episode he described as agreed quickly on a phone call.⁠[1][2]

On December 15, 2021, Nucleus Genomics announced a $3.5 million seed round led by Founders Fund, with participation from Forward Health CEO Adrian Aoun, Patrick HsuPatrick HsuPatrick Hsu is a biologist, a co-founder of the nonprofit biomedical research organization Arc Institute and an assistant professor of pathology at Stanford University.Open the full entry, a professor at the University of California, BerkeleyUniversity of California, BerkeleyThe University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) is a campus of the University of California system; the University of California was founded in 1868 through a merger of two institutions and moved to Berkeley, California, in 1873.Open the full entry and co-inventor of CRISPR, former Allergan CEO Brent Saunders, Eight Sleep CEO Matteo Franceschetti, DoNotPay CEO Joshua BrowderJoshua BrowderJoshua Browder is an entrepreneur and venture investor who founded the consumer-rights service DoNotPay in 2015 and leads it as chief executive; the service was once promoted as “the world’s first robot lawyer.” He was selected as a Thiel Fellow in 2018 and launched the venture fund Browder Capital. In September 2024 the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) brought an administrative complaint over DoNotPay’s “AI lawyer” claims; DoNotPay agreed to settle, and the final order was issued in January 2025.Open the full entry, Cory Levy, Adam Guild, Pareto Holdings, Pomp, Shrug, Ankur Nagpal, Quiet Capital, Salt Fund, Bluewatch Ventures, Night and Brandon White. TechCrunch wrote that the company was still listed as “stealth” on his LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry at the time.⁠[4]

TechCrunch described the planned product: users could upload genetic data from companies such as 23andMe23andMe23andMe is a consumer genetics and research brand offering ancestry and health-risk services. It is now operated by 23andMe Research Institute, a nonprofit based in Palo Alto, California.Open the full entry or Ancestry, or order a testing kit, and Nucleus would calculate polygenic risk scores with proprietary algorithms and show them on an easy-to-use platform. He summed up the vision as “a human genome on every iPhone,” combining genetic and non-genetic information to eventually calculate absolute risk scores for disease. The company also planned to become a third-party platform, under which users who opted in to sharing data with drug companies might receive a “dividend payment,” the amount undecided; it planned to launch around January 2022 and to grow from three to six or seven people.⁠[4]

On regulation, the article said that Nucleus would initially order tests through a clinical network, as Ancestry did, so that its algorithms would not need FDA approval at first; he said of FDA 510(k) clearance that “eventually, in the future, we do seek to go that route.” He argued that many of those who had yet to embrace genetic testing were younger people, whom Nucleus would reach through new distribution channels, and compared the goal to the way RobinhoodRobinhoodRobinhood is a financial services brand co-founded in 2013 by Vlad Tenev and Baiju Bhatt; its publicly listed parent company is Robinhood Markets, Inc., headquartered in Menlo Park, California, United States. The company has grown from commission-free mobile securities trading into crypto assets, retirement accounts, and other financial services, and trades on Nasdaq under the symbol HOOD.Open the full entry introduced many people to the stock market: “We can tap into a brand-new audience and introduce an entire generation to genetic testing.” The article noted that there was not much evidence for this, and that a 2017 survey found the average direct-to-consumer genetic testing user to be middle-aged, white and most likely a college-educated woman.⁠[4]

On July 14, 2022, Nucleus Genomics announced a $14 million “Seed+” round led by Alexis OhanianAlexis OhanianAlexis Ohanian (born April 24, 1983) is an American entrepreneur, investor, and author, a co-founder of Reddit and the founder of the venture capital firm Seven Seven Six. He graduated from the University of Virginia in 2005, co-founded Initialized Capital, and later expanded his work into women’s sports, climate philanthropy, and investment software.Open the full entry’s Seven Seven Six; the release’s headline puts its funding at $18 million in one year. Other investors included Founders Fund, Adrian Aoun, Brent Saunders, Patrick Hsu, Detect CEO Hugo Barra, Bloom Institute of TechnologyBloomTechBloomTech (Bloom Institute of Technology, formerly Lambda School) is a for-profit online coding school headquartered in San Francisco, founded in 2017 by Austen Allred and Ben Nelson; it came out of Y Combinator. It became known for income share agreements (ISAs), under which students study first and pay a share of their income once employed; it was later fined by a California regulator for operating in the state without approval, sued by students over its job placement claims and other issues, and in 2024 subjected to enforcement action by the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) over the loan nature of its ISAs and its job placement claims.Open the full entry CEO Austen Allred, Not Boring founder Packy McCormickPacky McCormickPacky McCormick is a writer and venture investor who founded the Not Boring newsletter and Not Boring Capital. He previously worked in investment banking and the flexible workspace business, turned in 2020 to writing focused on technology and business strategy, then took up angel and fund investing, and has been involved in an energy podcast and collaborative writing.Open the full entry, Shrug Capital, the influencer Alexandra BotezAlexandra BotezAlexandra Botez is an American-Canadian Woman FIDE Master, streamer and content creator who founded and co-hosts, with her sister Andrea Botez, the chess streaming channel BotezLive; she later moved into tournament poker and co-founded the game studio Millions of Monsters.Open the full entry and Anthony PomplianoAnthony PomplianoAnthony Pompliano (commonly known as “Pomp”) is an American investor, bitcoin advocate, and financial podcast host. He co-founded the investment firm Morgan Creek Digital Assets, and as of October 2026 he is Chairman and CEO of the Nasdaq-listed company Silvia, Inc. (formerly ProCap Financial) and runs the investment firm Professional Capital Management.Open the full entry.⁠[10]

The release described Nucleus, which he founded and which is based in New York City, as a next-generation consumer genetic testing and analysis company that uses whole-genome sequencing to offer rare-variant analysis and polygenic scores for diseases and traits, from breast cancer risk to longevity disposition, with users in total autonomy over their genetic data; users of microarray services such as 23andMe could upload their data for a subset of analyses centered on polygenic scores. He was quoted: “The promise of personalizing the healthcare experience was made decades ago,” and “Nucleus is bringing that promise to fruition, starting with consumer genetic testing.” The chief scientific officer at the time was Lasse Folkersen and the chief operations officer Caio Hachem.⁠[10]

On February 8, 2023, the Thiel Foundation announced its next class of 20 Thiel Fellows, listing him eleventh, with Brooklyn, New York, as his hometown; the announcement describes his project, Nucleus Genomics, as a next-generation consumer genetic testing and analysis company. The announcement states that the Thiel FellowshipThiel FellowshipThe Thiel Fellowship is a two-year grant program started by investor Peter Thiel and run by the Thiel Foundation that funds young people who skip or stop out of college to build new things instead. The program has been criticized by figures in education for encouraging young people to leave college.Open the full entry, launched in 2011, encourages young people with big ideas to start companies instead of attending college, and that during the two-year program fellows receive $100,000 and mentorship, on condition that they pause college enrollment; the class joined 251 previous fellows.⁠[11]

Nucleus’s June 2025 press release also states that he is a Thiel Fellow, and CBS News wrote that his backers include Peter ThielPeter ThielPeter Thiel is an American entrepreneur and investor, a co-founder of PayPal and Palantir Technologies, and the first outside investor in Facebook. He is a partner at the venture capital firm Founders Fund and founded the Thiel Fellowship, which funds young people to leave college and build new things; his public skepticism of higher education, his support for Trump in 2016, and his funding of litigation against Gawker Media have drawn controversy.Open the full entry and Alexis Ohanian.⁠[12][6]

In a blog post of July 6, 2024, Sasha Gusev, a statistical geneticist and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, wrote that Nucleus had recently launched a closed beta for genetic prediction of IQ, and that Nucleus IQ, a genetic predictor for adults, then existed publicly only as a sign-up screen. He wrote that Nucleus’s launch manifesto offered no evidence that the predictor was accurate and did not explain how the score was calculated, called the launch “an over-the-top edgy release to gin up a controversy,” and wrote that “they have a responsibility to inform their customers about the extremely low accuracy of their scores.” An update to the post notes that after it, Kian Sadeghi of Nucleus wrote about the company’s IQ prediction platform and discussed some of the criticism.⁠[13][8]

TechCrunch wrote in January 2025 that after Gusev questioned the accuracy of Nucleus’s IQ tests, Sadeghi published a lengthy defense; the article added that much remains unknown about the connection between genes and IQ, and that genetics can only account for so much, with environment handling the rest.⁠[5]

Freethink wrote that Nucleus, based in Brooklyn, launched its first product in August 2024: a whole-genome sequencing and analysis service for $399, plus a $39 annual membership for new features and reports. Customers send in cheek swabs, sequencing is done by Illumina at what the article calls 99.9% accuracy, and reports arrive about six weeks later. The reports include polygenic risk scores for more than 20 diseases; Nucleus had recently added Nucleus Traits (traits such as baldness or a willingness to take risks) and Nucleus Longevity (the likelihood of living past 80 compared with others like them). Nucleus partnered with the telehealth company SteadyMD so that users can book a genetic counselor for an additional fee. At launch he said: “Nucleus is the all-in-one genetic test.”⁠[3]

The same article stated that research suggests the ability of polygenic risk scores to predict disease risk is limited, especially for people who are not white, because genome databases lack diversity; that Nucleus’s analysis falls outside FDA jurisdiction, so it does not have to disclose how it reaches its predictions or prove their accuracy; and that some worry people may spend money on screenings they do not need or become anxious about diseases they cannot prevent, such as Alzheimer’s.⁠[3]

On September 3, 2024, he was the guest of episode 253 of the Fitt Insider podcast. The episode description states that he had raised more than $18 million for complete DNA health tests and that, by democratizing whole-genome sequencing, he aims to save millions from preventable disease; the episode discussed the company’s “trillion-dollar vision” for the future of healthcare.⁠[7]

On January 30, 2025, Nucleus Genomics announced a $14 million Series A, bringing its total funding to about $32 million; TechCrunch wrote that his backers included Alexis Ohanian’s Seven Seven Six, Balaji SrinivasanBalaji SrinivasanBalaji Srinivasan is an entrepreneur, investor and the author of The Network State, the founder of Network School, and a former chief technology officer of Coinbase and general partner at Andreessen Horowitz. He co-founded Counsyl and 21, along with its successor product Earn.com, was involved in projects such as Coin Center, and has backed companies such as fomo as an angel investor.Open the full entry and SpaceXSpaceXSpaceX is a company founded by Elon Musk in 2002 whose businesses include space transportation, Starlink satellite communications and artificial intelligence. It went public in 2026 under the ticker SPCX.Open the full entry alum Achal Upadhyaya, and described Nucleus as a Founders Fund-backed startup. Femtech Insider wrote in 2026 that the Series A was led by Founders Fund and Seven Seven Six, with participation from Neo and Balaji Srinivasan.⁠[5][14]

TechCrunch explained that Nucleus has saliva samples sequenced by a third party and compares the results with extensive data linking health issues to genes, charging $400 per sample; he said: “one swab and you get your analysis on about 800-plus conditions,” adding that the number would grow rapidly over the following months. Founders Fund partner Delian AsparouhovDelian AsparouhovDelian Asparouhov is a Bulgarian-born American venture capitalist and entrepreneur. He is a partner at Founders Fund and co-founded the in-orbit pharmaceutical processing and reentry capsule company Varda Space Industries with Will Bruey, serving as its president; he also co-founded The Hill & Valley Forum, which connects Washington policymakers with the Silicon Valley technology community.Open the full entry showed his own dashboard, saying it suggested a predisposition to schizophrenia, a sky-high IQ and prostate cancer, and shrugged: “Bummer.” Asparouhov argued that “it's best to just give consumers the information that's available to them and let them decide,” and imagined future dating apps that combine two people’s genetic tests to show what a child might inherit. Asked whether linking blue eyes, blonde hair and IQ could be interpreted as eugenics, Asparouhov said with a laugh: “I said brown hair!”⁠[5]

TechCrunch called Nucleus “controversial” in its headline; the article noted that others had pointed out that Nucleus’s IQ tests could lead to discrimination and stigmatization, and recalled 23andMe’s explanation to MIT Technology Review in 2018 that it would not release intelligence-related results for fear of misinterpretation.⁠[5]

Fortune wrote on March 23, 2025, that Nucleus was launching a genetic matching feature called “multiplayer mode,” with which future parents can see how their DNA aligns, estimating a couple’s risk of passing on more than 900 conditions to their children. The article said that an individual swab test cost $399 and covered risk assessments for more than 900 conditions, including cancer, heart disease, cognition and focus, and that members could pay an additional $99 for hour sessions with a genetic counselor. He said the company calculates couples’ “risk of passing down over 900 different conditions to their children,” and “We don't currently provide predictions for future babies on anything outside of hereditary disease”; he also said that customer health data is not shared with third parties and that the company is HIPAA compliant, with all samples analyzed in a U.S. laboratory.⁠[8]

Asked about eugenics, he said: “It has nothing to do with eugenics,” and “It's all about choice. It's up to the couple.” Fortune wrote that when Delian Asparouhov was asked whether phenotype matching was a form of modern eugenics, he made a joke, “miming the same hand motion that Elon MuskElon MuskElon Musk is an entrepreneur who founded SpaceX and has long served as chief executive of Tesla; he also took part in creating PayPal, OpenAI, Neuralink, The Boring Company, and xAI. He acquired Twitter in 2022, and his businesses span spaceflight, electric vehicles, energy, artificial intelligence, and social media.Open the full entry performed following President Trump's inauguration,” and said “My heart goes out to you”; on this, Sadeghi said: “I personally wasn't in and cannot comment on what was said or alluded to,” and “we do not agree with any comments likening genetic tests to eugenics.” In the same article Sasha Gusev called Nucleus an “outlier” in the field; he said that rare disease screening is “of real clinical importance,” while partner screening before having children is a relatively new use that had not been offered, and that “We are many steps away from where this is real and actionable”; of the IQ predictions he said: “It echoes concerns about eugenics.” The article also noted that the Nucleus website says researchers are “still in the early stages of understanding how genetics impacts IQ.”⁠[8]

On June 4, 2025, Nucleus announced Nucleus Embryo, software for analyzing embryo genetics, together with a partnership with the embryo screening company Genomic Prediction. The release said that parents could use it to analyze and compare up to 20 embryos across more than 900 hereditary conditions, plus 40 additional analyses beyond basic viability, spanning cancers, chronic conditions, appearance, cognitive ability, mental health and more. He was quoted: “Before there's a heartbeat, there's DNA,” and “Most clinics stop at whether an embryo will develop.” Kelly Ketterson, CEO of Genomic Prediction, said: “As an organization, we are committed to supporting patients' rights to their DNA.”⁠[12]

Femtech Insider wrote on June 11 that Nucleus does not conduct tests directly through IVF laboratories; parents upload genetic data after standard screening through Genomic Prediction. He called his favorite feature the fact that “you can even name your embryos and leave notes on the ones you like.” The article pointed to the National Human Genome Research Institute’s explanation that polygenic scores can only explain the relative risk for a disease and work primarily within populations, not for individual predictions, and wrote that expanding selection criteria to intelligence, appearance and personality traits ventures into “designer baby” territory that many find deeply uncomfortable.⁠[15]

On August 27, 2025, Nucleus and Beverly Hills Fertility announced an exclusive partnership under which the clinic became the first to join the Nucleus IVF+ Network and to offer Nucleus Embryo to its patients, covering more than 2,000 hereditary conditions and chronic conditions such as heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease and type 2 diabetes. The release named Nathan Treff as Nucleus’s chief clinical officer. He was quoted: “We heard from thousands of parents following the launch of Nucleus Embryo — many of whom I spoke to personally.”⁠[16]

On October 21, 2025, Nucleus announced Nucleus Labs, an AI genomics research arm, and released Origin, a family of nine “genetic optimization” models, with open weights. The company said that Origin outperformed all previous accuracy benchmarks in predicting health and longevity from an embryo’s DNA, and that with five embryos couples could expect a reduction of more than 50% in the risk of common diseases such as Alzheimer’s, diabetes and cancers. He said: “Too much of genetic optimization has been shrouded in secrecy,” and “We reject that.”⁠[17]

AxiosAxiosAxios is a US digital news media company founded in 2016 by former Politico executives Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen, and Roy Schwartz and launched in January 2017. It is known for short news items and industry newsletters in the “Smart Brevity” style, especially for its Washington political coverage, and publishes local news newsletters in cities across the United States through Axios Local. Since 2022 it has been owned by Cox Enterprises.Open the full entry wrote that day that Origin covers Alzheimer’s, breast cancer, coronary heart disease, endometriosis, hypertension, prostate cancer, arthritis, and type 1 and type 2 diabetes, analyzing 7 million genetic markers with algorithms trained on data from 1.5 million people; parents can choose these tests through IVF+, a concierge service starting at $30,000 that also screens for more than 2,000 genetic conditions and traits, including IQ and hair color predictions. He called genomics “one of the greatest preventative medicine tools that's ever existed.” The article also noted that critics cited in Wall Street Journal reporting say such tests “could draw a further divide between certain types of children in society.”⁠[9]

On October 23, 2025, Genomic Prediction announced that it had sued its former employees Nathan Treff and Talia Metzgar, and Treff’s new employer, Nucleus Genomics, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey; it describes Treff as a former officer. Genomic Prediction alleged that Treff intentionally misappropriated its trade secrets on embryonic DNA sequencing, amplification methods and its LifeView software platform, and willfully destroyed data on his company-issued laptop; it claimed that some of the misappropriated information had already been used by Nucleus as part of an intentional plan to enable Nucleus to launch competing preimplantation genetic testing products. It asked for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction, enforcement of Treff’s non-compete, expedited discovery orders, and the return or permanent destruction of its confidential information. Genomic Prediction CEO Kelly Ketterson said: “Genomic Prediction supports fair and ethical competition, which is essential to scientific advancement,” and said that the lawsuit was about protecting innovation and scientific integrity rather than competition itself.⁠[18]

On a campaign page signed by him, Nucleus writes that on November 17, 2025, it launched its “most ambitious ad campaign” throughout New York City under the slogan “Have Your Best Baby,” including a full-station takeover of the walls, stairwells, corridors and turnstiles of the Broadway–Lafayette subway station in SoHo, Manhattan, and posters and decals in SoHo around five major IVF clinics, promoting its IVF+ and Preview services. The page says: “Every family deserves to know that these tools exist, they're safe,” and “Not every parent will want to use them, and that's okay.” The page excerpts press coverage, including a New York PostNew York PostThe New York Post is a daily newspaper in New York City, published by New York Post Media Group, a News Corp company.Open the full entry figure of a 1,700% increase in sales since the ads began going up on November 14.⁠[19]

In an article of December 5, MIT Technology Review reporter Antonio Regalado wrote that the subway ads promoted Pickyourbaby.com, with banners reading “Height is 80% genetic.” and “IQ is 50% genetic.”; he wrote that Kian Sadeghi pointed out that the ads do not mention DNA or explain the scoring, and commented: “In advertising, you sell the sizzle, not the steak.” Sadeghi said that the campaign would soon spread to 1,000 train cars. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority did not allow ads reading “Have a girl” and “Have a boy,” under its policy barring the use of government-owned infrastructure to promote “invidious discrimination” against protected classes, which include biological sex. In the interview he said: “We're bringing it mainstream,” and “we are normalizing it, right?”, and said that parents “can have a taller, smarter, healthier baby.”⁠[20]

Regalado wrote that Kian Sadeghi had shown off on X a phone app in which parents can click through traits such as eye color and hair color, and commented that this “sounded a lot like Uber Eats—another crappy, frictionless future invented by entrepreneurs,” adding that it makes one wonder whether the ads should be permitted; Sadeghi, for his part, prefers to compare Nucleus to AirbnbAirbnbAirbnb is a travel platform for booking stays, experiences, and services, co-founded by Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, and Nathan Blecharczyk and headquartered in San Francisco, United States; its Class A common stock trades on Nasdaq under the symbol ABNB. The business began with hosting guests in the founders’ home in 2007, then joined YC’s Winter 2009 batch, and gradually expanded into local experiences, services, and boutique hotels.Open the full entry and hopes it can act as a digital “funnel” connecting customers with clinics and offering a “better experience.” The article states that “professional groups say the genetic predictions aren't reliable” and that some doctors worry about creating unrealistic parental expectations. In the same article Noor SiddiquiNoor SiddiquiNoor Siddiqui is an entrepreneur who founded and leads Orchid, a reproductive technology company that offers whole-genome screening of embryos; she was selected for the Thiel Fellowship in 2012 and earlier co-founded the health technology company Remedy.Open the full entry, founder of the competitor Orchid, said at an online event in August: “Doctors are essentially being shoved in the direction of using it,” “because they will lose patients if they don't.”⁠[20]

Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, the law firm representing Nucleus Genomics and its employee Nathan Treff, wrote on November 20, 2025, that Judge Susan D. Wigenton of the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey had denied Genomic Prediction’s motion in its entirety, finding that it had failed to meet its burden to show a likelihood of success and that the alleged harm had not been shown to be emergent or incapable of remedy at trial, and denying its request for expedited discovery.⁠[21]

On December 3, 2025, he was interviewed on CBSCBSCBS is an American commercial broadcast television network. It was founded in 1927 as United Independent Broadcasters, renamed the Columbia Broadcasting System in 1928, and grew from a radio network into a television network under William S. Paley. With ABC and NBC it is one of the three traditional U.S. broadcast networks; it has been owned in turn by Westinghouse, Viacom, ViacomCBS and Paramount Global, has been owned by Paramount Skydance Corporation since 2025, and is one of the five networks that rotate in the White House television pool.Open the full entry Mornings, and CBS News published an article by Tony Dokoupil and Jennifer Earl the same day. The article stated that Nucleus’s IVF+ service costs $30,000 and includes full DNA scans of both parents and analysis of up to 20 IVF embryos, screening for more than 2,000 traits and conditions, including eye color, hair color, intelligence and acne, and estimating genetic predisposition to depression, autism and bipolar disorder; it stated that the company had already helped thousands of families.⁠[6]

In the interview he said: “We give you the full range of insights there is to know about your future child,” and “We really think it's the parents' right to know”; on eugenics, he said it was not eugenics “by any stretch, because it's fundamentally about empowering people with information that they can use to give their child the best start in life”; and he said: “Our predictors can better predict longevity from an embryo's DNA than any other genetic model ever built.” The article noted that a statement by the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics the previous year had said that embryo screening with polygenic risk scores had “moved too fast with too little evidence,” and that critics have compared the practice to eugenics.⁠[6]

Femtech Insider wrote on February 25, 2026, that Nucleus Genomics had received a strategic investment from Samsung Next. The article stated that Nucleus’s whole-genome test then cost $499, was ordered by a physician, sequenced approximately 100% of a patient’s DNA and covered more than 2,000 diseases and conditions, and was run through a CLIA-certified, CAP-accredited U.S. laboratory; Nucleus had acquired Cambrean, an AI-powered wearable health platform, and partnered with Bryan JohnsonBryan JohnsonBryan Johnson is an entrepreneur and investor who founded Braintree and OS Fund and later pursued neurotechnology and personal health experimentation through Project Blueprint and the Don’t Die initiative.Open the full entry’s Don’t Die longevity program and with fertility clinics in the United States and abroad. The article stated that Nucleus stood out to Samsung Next for “its scientific rigor, delivering validated clinical-grade results rather than entertainment-grade ancestry estimates.”⁠[14]

As of November 2026, the Nucleus website lists him as the company’s founder and CEO; the site’s product sections include Health, Preview, IVF+ and Embryo, alongside the research arm Nucleus Labs.⁠[19]

In an August 2025 podcast he mentioned his brother, Kamyar.⁠[2]

Ages printed by the press: TechCrunch in January 2025, Fortune in March 2025 and CBS News in December 2025 all gave his age as 25; MIT Technology Review, in its article of December 5, 2025, gave it as 26.⁠[5][8][6][20]

In the Freethink article he said: “There's really no such thing as a genetics company — there are only healthcare companies,” and “The promise of the Human Genome Project has finally arrived.”⁠[3]

In the October 2025 Axios article he argued that the technology was not new, since IVF clinics already screen embryos for chromosomal abnormalities linked to conditions such as Down syndrome; on what parents pass on to their children, he said: “This idea that parents pass down their values.” “They pass down their ethics, and they pass down where they're from, their food, etc., and they also pass down their DNA.” “I think we can do that more thoughtfully, more carefully.” On CBS Mornings he said of height and IQ that “they're abstractions of life,” and pushed back on the criticism that he is creating a new class of “superhumans,” saying: “DNA is not destiny,” and that nurture, such as how hard a child works, will never go away.⁠[9][6]

Nucleus Genomics: Official website: https://mynucleus.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[19]

Thiel Fellowship: Official website: https://thielfellowship.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[22]

X: Public account: https://x.com/KianSadeghi5 (opens in a new window).⁠[23]

LinkedIn: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kian-sadeghi-8273ba178/ (opens in a new window).⁠[23]