Professor Michael Kassiou spent more than a decade hunting for molecules small enough to enter the brain and activate our oxytocin receptors, which scientists have long suspected could be a potent method for treating dementia, depression and schizophrenia.

After years of that painstaking work, one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies has put a price on the molecules he discovered: more than a quarter of a billion dollars.

The company Kassiou founded with University of Sydney colleagues to commercialise the molecules, Kinoxis, has signed a $US181 million partnership ($A273 million) with Boehringer Ingelheim to investigate drugs that treat aggression and social withdrawal in people with a range of psychiatric disorders.

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