Yes. There are other companies that seek to preserve freshness. Our products specifically target fungal infections.

Thanks! In the US, >50% if fruits and vegetables are wasted. (Not all because of fungal rot, of course.)

I'm not aware of these.

There are a number of meat-replacement startup companies, developing replacements for fish, chicken, beef, etc., either by formulating products with protein or animal cells, or with vegetable protein that is formulated to taste and mouthfeel of actual meat.

Interesting question! We're not currently granting licenses, but may be interested in research collaborations in the future. We did find one very interesting mystery, three morphotypes of a single bacteria (as determined by 16S sequence), that could grow together and influence each others' frequency in the population.

The types of microbes used in our products naturally occur in the soil. Our products pass through the required registration processes to ensure safety.

Yes, but which soil and sourced from where? This is an insufficient answer to the question "will our selection of microbes destroy existing biomes?"

Thanks for the good wishes!

We can track changes in the micro-ecosystems by sequencing the soil or root metagenomes. We aren't doing this yet, but it's on the path forward.

From the pub you reference, it looks like some fungi can be beneficial. But many are not - many fungi cause wilts, rots, etc.

We only use naturally-occurring microbes, without genetic engineering. We focus on the unit of the cell, rather than the unit of the gene, to make our products.

Are you able to target detrimental fungi while sparing nitrogen-fixing species, along with those that naturally prey on insects?

These are soil isolates - no generic engineering of the strains. One of the lead product active ingredients includes both the bacterium and the yeast.

The microbes we're using as products come from the soil. The tech to identify them uses understanding the interaction between microbes, so that we can thoughtfully determine which microbes are best suited for a product - we can exclude candidates with any known toxicity issues or negative externalities.

Biological pesticides have a much lower threshold for regulatory approval specifically because they are deemed safer than chemical pesticides.

Customers like replacing their chemical pesticides with our product to lower residual levels of chemicals on their produce. Other countries have more restrictive MRLs (maximum residue levels) permitted on imports than the US does, so products like these are valuable.

To me it sounds like your 'consortia' are much like what Permaculture calls 'guilds': sets of species that work together synergistically.

I'm not familiar with Permaculture, but yes, that sounds right.

In grapes, our lead consortium prevented botrytis, a key fungal pathogen, to a level statistically indistinguishable from chemical pesticides. Biological don't typically do that well.

We anticipate benefits that we have yet to prove: higher efficacy, lower risk that the target will evolve resistance, and better persistence in the soil.