When it comes to boosting brain performance, Ārepa co-founder Angus Brown believes the answers lie not in pharmaceuticals — but in nature. For more than a decade, his Auckland-based company has been researching at the intersection of nature, neuroscience and food tech to make scalable brain food products backed by science powering their mission to make brains work better globally through nutrition.
That search led them to a small, dark berry grown largely in the South Island — the blackcurrant — and an even smaller molecule hidden within it that could change the game for mental well-being.
“We call them “Neuroberry” blackcurrants – special varieties that were showing pharmaceutical-like effects in humans” says Angus. “It was inhibiting an enzyme called MAO — a sort of Pac-Man that eats up your serotonin and dopamine. People with depression, Parkinson’s, or even chronic stress and sleep deprivation often have too much of it.”
Working alongside Callaghan Innovation and Plant & Food Research, Ārepa’s team isolated the compound responsible: a glycoside molecule they’ve named Sarmentosin. In a world-first study, they proved it was the first ever plant-based compound shown to inhibit MAO activity in humans — a major scientific milestone.
That discovery led to global patent protection, and an invitation to join a leading food-tech accelerator in San Francisco called MISTA, where Ārepa showcased their findings to hundreds of international food and ingredient companies.
But back home, another challenge awaited — how to sustainably extract Sarmentosin from blackcurrants at scale. This is where the Bioresource Processing Alliance (BPA) stepped in.
“Through the BPA, we received funding and expert support to develop a commercially viable process for recovering Sarmentosin from the blackcurrant production stream,” says Angus. “It turned out that most of this precious molecule was literally being tipped down the drain with the sugar water — the waste stream from extract manufacturing.”
With BPA support, Ārepa and their partners at Callaghan Innovation have now developed a method to capture Sarmentosin from that waste, creating not just one, but two high-value products: traditional blackcurrant polyphenols and this newly discovered brain-active molecule.
They’ve already achieved 25% purity — an extraordinary leap from the trace amounts found in juice — and are now scaling production from milligrams to kilograms. With material being used for continued human research. The project, set to complete in early 2026, also aims to refine the techno-economics to make Sarmentosin-enriched ingredients affordable for use in everyday products like capsules and drinks.
For Angus, it’s about far more than just beverages.
“We’re building the science behind a new class of natural brain nutrition,” he says. “The BPA has helped us take that next step — from lab discovery to something the world can actually use.”
Angus is one of the keynote speakers at our forthcoming Sustainable Solutions Symposium. For more information, registration and ticket sales, see the symposium website: https://bpa-sss.co.nz/
You can read more about Ārepa and their journey here: https://drinkarepa.com/
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