HONG KONG – South Korea's biopharmaceutical venture Genome & Co. Ltd. recently secured KRW30.2 billion (US$25.2 million) in series C investment with an IPO and global clinical trial plans for next year.

"Microbiome" has become a health and wellness buzzword, implicated as a contributing factor in conditions ranging from diabetes and obesity to gastrointestinal disease, autoimmune diseases and even autism. But the tools scientists use to cultivate bacteria have changed little over the past century, said Peter Christey, founder and CEO of San Carlos, Calif.-based startup General Automation Lab Technologies Inc. (GALT).

HONG KONG – Kobiolabs Inc., a microbiome-based venture from Seoul, South Korea, has secured a KRW26.6 billion (US$22.2 million) investment. Founded in 2014, the venture has achieved KRW193 billion of enterprise value.

HONG KONG – Kobiolabs Inc., a microbiome-based venture from Seoul, South Korea, has secured a ?26.6 billion (US$22.2 million) investment. Founded in 2014, the venture has achieved ?193 billion of enterprise value.

Synthetic biology is seeing rapid advances, but the medical applications have thus far remained largely elusive. But now researchers from the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have developed a tool that can track specific populations of bacteria in the gut of living organisms and document population changes over time.

"Microbiome" has become a health and wellness buzzword, implicated as a contributing factor in conditions ranging from diabetes and obesity to gastrointestinal disease, autoimmune diseases and even autism. But the tools scientists use to cultivate bacteria have changed little over the past century, says Peter Christey, founder and CEO of San Carlos, Calif.-based startup General Automation Lab Technologies Inc. (GALT). His firm is hoping to change that with a high-throughput system of hugely parallel arrays and high-resolution images of complex samples that will revolutionize the way microbiology laboratories process genetic material.

Synthetic biology is seeing rapid advances, but the medical applications have thus far remained largely elusive. But now researchers from the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have developed a tool that can track specific populations of bacteria in the gut of living organisms and document population changes over time.

HONG KONG – GI Innovation Inc., a microbiome combination drug developer based in Seoul, South Korea, has recently issued fully paid convertible preferred stock (CPS) worth KRW37.5 billion (US$31 million) for a series B investment.

BOSTON – The gut microbiome and its prospects for drug development have been matters of debate for a while, sharpened by the high-profile phase II failure of Seres Therapeutics Inc.'s candidate, SER-109, in the summer of 2016. A panel at Biopharm America surveyed the space in light of developments since the stumble with that candidate, composed of about 50 species of firmicutes spores derived from stool specimens from healthy donors, against recurrent Clostridium difficile infection. 

The ultimate vision is pretty fantastical: A variety of synthetically engineered bacteria working together to diagnose – and even secrete proteins to treat – various inflammatory conditions or other immune-associated diseases. But researchers at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School have taken another step along the path toward that goal.