Diffusion Pharmaceuticals LLC is a biotechnology and drug development company based in Charlottesville, Virginia, U.S. It was co-founded in 2001 by American life sciences entrepreneur David Kalergis and University of Virginia Chemical Engineering Professor John L. Gainer. Gainer is the inventor of the company’s platform technology of oxygen diffusion-enhancing compounds and its lead drug, trans sodium crocetinate (TSC). TSC acts to increase the rate at which oxygen moves through blood plasma by the process of diffusion, a phenomenon that forms the basis for the company's name. TSC and other oxygen diffusion-enhancing compounds, including bipolar trans carotenoid salts (the subclass to which TSC belongs), have been investigated by Diffusion Pharmaceuticals for treatment of conditions associ