SYNVITROBIO, INC. — Department of Defense STTR Phase I: A18B-T016

Description

There is a need to develop affordable and specific biosensors to defend against current and future biological threats. Biological methods of detection have been evolved by nature to detect molecules at the micro-scale with flexible specificity and with downstream effectors. Advances in cell-free technology allow for deployment of biosensors on pH-strip-type paper, an affordable, robust, disposable, and highly portable format for Field use. Synvitrobio and UW Madison propose developing BioSENSE, a product built off of cell-free expression to produce allosteric transcription factor (aTF) biosensors to DoD-relevant molecules with turnaround of 2-months or less. BioSENSE combines computational aTF design with high-throughput cell-free expression to rapidly test design iterations for activity. In Phase I, we will show the development and use of BioSENSE to sense model molecules, as well as engineered ligands to detect toxins. The identified biosensors can be implemented on paper for deployable detection, or can be used within engineered cells. In Phase II, we will scale BioSENSE to develop biosensors towards DoD-defined molecules of interest.