Project Grant R43GM137719

This Project Grant award of $408,007 from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) aims to develop a technology called "glycosequencing" that uses next-generation sequencing (NGS) to sequence and quantify glycan structures. The project will first identify an optimal set of lectins, biochemically characterize them, and prepare lectin barcoding for NGS. It will also build a training dataset using recombinant proteins produced in glycoengineered Chinese...

This Project Grant award of $283,805 from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) under the Biomedical Research and Research Training Program (CFDA 93.859) supports the development of a novel cell-free, high-throughput platform to expedite the engineering of enzymes for biocatalytic "bioclick" reactions. The project, led by Invizyne Technologies, Inc., a self-certified small disadvantaged business in Monrovia, California, aims to integrate cell-free protein synthesis...

Professor Liming Zhang of the University of California, Santa Barbara will develop new methods for the automated synthesis of glycans under a three-year, $575,000 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation Division of Chemistry. The grant falls under the NSF's Mathematical and Physical Sciences program (CFDA 47.049). Specifically, Professor Zhang will further develop and validate the Directing-Group-on-Leaving-Group strategy for stereoselective glycosylation reactions appropriate for...

This Project Grant award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) under the Biomedical Research and Research Training Program (CFDA 93.859) will fund the development of a new glycan binding protein (GBP)-based glycosylation analysis system. The $306,710 award to Z Biotech, LLC will be used to: 1) Collect a large glycan array dataset to improve the accuracy of glycan structural predictions from binding data; 2) Expand the coverage of glycan epitopes by incorporating...

This National Science Foundation (NSF) Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (CFDA 47.084) Project Grant award of $274,918 to Cascade Biocatalysts Inc. will fund research and development to demonstrate the commercial feasibility and scalability of a patent-pending approach for stabilizing enzymes through engineered polymer-enzyme interactions. The goal is to enable environmentally sustainable, low-carbon chemical manufacturing processes that utilize enzymes as catalysts, which can decrease...

This SBIR Phase I award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (TIP) program (CFDA 47.084) provides $275,000 to Caravel Bio, Inc. to develop a novel synthetic biology platform for high-throughput directed evolution of spore-displayed enzymes. The project aims to create customizable enzyme solutions for industrial biocatalyst applications by improving key properties like enzyme activity, stability, and loading density. The technology uses a...

This Project Grant award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), under CFDA Program 93.859 Biomedical Research and Research Training, provides $693,510 to Revel Pharmaceuticals Inc. to develop a rapid, inexpensive enzymatic test for the detection of carboxyethyl lysine (CEL) protein adducts. CEL is an important marker of advanced glycation endproducts (AGEs), which are associated with aging and diseases like diabetes. Current CEL measurement techniques are slow,...

Simmbion LLC was awarded a $255,136 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation's Small Business Technology Transfer program to develop a system for manufacturing drug therapies inside the human body. Over the one-year period from April 2022 to March 2023, the company will genetically engineer symbiotic blood organisms to express and secrete two therapeutic proteins - β-glucocerebrosidase to treat Gaucher's disease and insulin for diabetes treatment. In vitro and in vivo testing will...

This Project Grant award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) under the Biomedical Research and Research Training Program (CFDA 93.859) will support a comprehensive research project to investigate the structure and enzymology of the glucose-6-phosphatase catalytic subunit 1 (G6PC1), a key regulator of glucose metabolism in the liver. The $338,889 award to Vanderbilt University will be used to employ complementary biophysical and computational techniques, including...

The National Institutes of Health National Institute of General Medical Sciences awarded a $903,000 Project Grant to The University of Toledo to develop new glycosylation methods for microbial glycan synthesis under the Biomedical Research and Research Training program (CFDA 93.859). Over a three-year period from September 2022 to August 2025, the University will create two new catalytic glycosylation methodologies - a cationic gold(I)-catalyzed glycosylation using glycosyl...