Startup Spotlight

With recent progress in developing tools that can manipulate genetic material, the concept of ‘Synthetic Biology’ has rapidly evolved and applies the principles of engineering to the world of biotechnology. Early research focussed on the alteration of simple pathways, but now the creation of entirely synthetic microorganisms is possible. Genetic modification has often been a controversial issue in the context of our food systems, but employing new technologies which introduce beneficial properties to our food may help to pave a new way forward for the debate in this area.

Lewis Wallis

December 13, 2024

Apeikon Therapeutics has developed a revolutionary new technology for cancer treatment. As a spin-out company, Apeikon was born out of the significant discoveries made over the last 14 years at King’s College London by Dr Maya Thanou. Apeikon Therapeutics is working on a novel technology that will substantially improve the efficacy and reduce the side effects of cancer drugs through directed activation of drug delivery.

December 13, 2024

Proteins are essential across many aspects of our lives, from food and therapeutics, to the industrial enzymes currently in use to degrade plastics and other undesirable climate-damaging products out there. Eden Bio was founded in 2022 with the vision of using machine learning to optimise how these proteins get produced. Using their suite of computational and wet-lab tools, the team quickly screen the many possible genetic modifications that can be made to fungal strains to improve how much protein the strain can produce, helping their customers improve their yield and get their exciting new protein products to market quicker.

Aonghus Topham

December 13, 2024

Unaffordable, imprecise, and an untimely disease diagnosis undermines the global healthcare system, contributing to increased morbidity and mortality. The rising prevalence of diseases such as cancer and neurological disorders need a timely diagnosis for better management. New drug therapies for chronic diseases are needed and being developed, but currently, the cost of development through screening and trials of compounds is prohibitive, restricting patient access. Through their novel technology, ChronosDx is developing a promising bioassay to circumvent these challenges.

George William Ssendagala

December 13, 2024

Currently based at the University of Sheffield in the Chemical and Biological Engineering department, Evolutor was created following the amazing work of Prof. Tuck Seng Wong and Dr Kang Lan Tee, through which CEO, Joe Price, envisioned the evolutionary microbe development company: Evolutor. Evolutor’s Accelerated Evolution Platform allows them to use the power of adaptive evolution to create improved microbes for industrial usage. With this platform, their ambition is to build the world’s first evolutionary bio-foundry...

Rachel Thompson

December 13, 2024

Pear Bio is revolutionising the way cancer treatments are assigned to patients. They have developed a functional precision medicine platform by integrating tissue engineering, confocal microscopy, and computer vision into a single patient stratification tool. This facilitates the assessment of the treatment efficacy in the human tumour microenvironment by modelling the impact a drug or a combination of drugs has on the progression of disease.

Aonghus Topham

December 13, 2024