Wednesday, June 21, 2023
Pearl Bio, a synthetic biology company supported by Khosla Ventures, is pioneering a new era of biologics and biomaterials through life recoding. Recently, they have secured a breakthrough U.S. patent, numbered 11,649,446, which focuses on engineering programmable biologics by incorporating synthetic chemistries. This patent strengthens Pearl's patent portfolio and grants them exclusive rights to explore the market of multi-functionalized biologics.
At the core of Pearl Bio's success are their distinguished team members, who are world leaders in synthetic biology, genome recoding, and ribosome engineering. The team includes Dr. George Church, serving on Pearl Bio's Scientific Advisory Board, as well as Drs. Farren Isaacs and Jesse Rinehart from Yale University, and Dr. Michael Jewett from Stanford University. Their collective expertise drives Pearl Bio's groundbreaking advancements in the field, propelling them to the forefront of innovation.
Pearl Bio, led by Co-Founder Amy Cayne Schwartz, utilizes the incorporation of diverse synthetic chemistries into proteins to achieve remarkable capabilities in biologic therapeutics. This approach allows Pearl to finely tune the half-life of the therapeutics, enable targeted delivery to diseased cells, and attach cytotoxic payloads, overcoming significant barriers that hinder market approval.
The company's platform is supported by an impressive portfolio of 24 exclusively licensed patents and applications, which have been developed over the past decade by Pearl's scientific Co-Founders, Dr. Isaacs and Dr. Jewett. With this robust intellectual property foundation, Pearl Bio is actively forging partnerships with pharmaceutical companies while also advancing its internal programs to create next-generation "smart" biologics.
The combination of the newly-issued patent with existing broad blocking patents on genomically recoded organisms, tethered ribosomes, and engineered translational machinery empowers Pearl Bio to explore new frontiers. By encoding synthetic monomers at specific sites, they can derive novel biologics and biomaterials with precision and control.
Pearl Bio's technology not only preserves the natural activity of proteins but also imparts valuable therapeutic properties. This innovative approach addresses critical challenges in biologic drug development, such as toxicity, stability, and targeted delivery, thereby expediting the path to market. For instance, the ability to design compounds that sustain the presence of cytotoxic payloads in the tumor microenvironment, coupled with access to novel targets, opens up entirely new therapeutic possibilities. This has the potential to address unmet medical needs and significantly improve patients' quality of life.
