There’s an urgent threat consuming the planet. Perhaps surprisingly, a fungus may be the best chance at stopping it.
This threat is known as candida auris, a multi drug-resistant pathogen that’s spreading quickly and isn’t affected by current treatments. Things are so dire, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has designated its emergence as an “urgent threat” requiring the highest level of concern.
Enter a startup called Clue Genetics. This fungal-focused biotech company is developing all-natural, fungi-derived products that can stop this threat.
Using these fungi, Clue Genetics is creating products with applications in areas like crop protection, animal health, home-protection products, and topical anti-infectives.
Fungi represent one of the most underexplored kingdoms of life. Yet they offer powerful solutions to global challenges.
Only about 150,000 fungal species have been formally described out of an estimated 2.2 to 3.8 million in total. And recent analyses suggest that less than 1% of fungal biosynthetic potential has been functionally characterized.
ClueGen is applying sequencing, screening, and synthetic biology tools to its proprietary fungal strain library of over 50,000 living isolates. These resources are used to identify and develop compounds for pharmaceuticals, agriculture, industrial enzymes, and more
ClueGen operates in a space with wide-ranging commercial potential. Natural products from fungi are used in therapeutics, crop treatments, materials, and consumer goods. The company estimates a mid-term total target addressable market for its products of more than $200 billion and long-term total addressable market opportunities exceeding $1 trillion.
To date, ClueGen has more than 3,000 fungal strains of DNA fingerprinted and more than 400 bioactive molecules identified. It has its first license revenues secured and has been awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) SBIR Phase I grant.
The company’s licensing model is expected to generate revenue through platform access, annual licenses, and royalties from end-product sales.