Thiel-Backed Varda to Take Drugs to Space for Microgravity Test

United Therapeutics Corp.is working with Varda Space Industries Inc.to explore the use of microgravity in creating drugs for chronic diseases in a deal that could prove out the value of in-space development for the pharmaceutical industry.

Varda, backed by Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, will send United Therapeutics’ medicines into orbit on small capsules with no crew, where the drug samples will undergo chemical processing in space, according to Michael Reilly, chief strategy officer at El Segundo, California-based Varda.

United Therapeutics’ scientists then will study the effects of microgravity on the molecules days or weeks later when they ...