LUNA INNOVATIONS INCORPORATED — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: A17-018

Description

In response to the defined need for improve conditions for warfighters to avoid problematic fungal skin infections, Luna Innovations is proposing the development of the Agastache antifungal textile treatment: a novel method to specifically target and kill pathogenic fungi. Agastache is envisioned as a platform textile treatment, capable of being permanently applied to any common textile, and will have fast acting antifungal effects on pathogenic fungi in close proximity, however not on any other members of the normal healthy skin flora. The Agastache platform technology has applications for specific targeting of other infectious microorganisms as well, both as a textile treatment, and potentially as an administered therapeutic. The Agastache fabric treatment technology will be demonstrated in laboratory-scale microbial growth conditions and assays. Successful discrimination of pathogenic fungi and commensal microbial species by the Agastache antifungal technology when attached to a solid support will enable the further development of a textile-based testing system.