Federal Grant Award Summary

Proteovista LLC received a $306,151 Project Grant award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) under the Biomedical Research and Research Training program (CFDA 93.859) to develop ClusterBuild, a novel platform for cost-effective synthesis of large biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs). The award, dated June 2, 2026, with completion by May 31, 2027, supports research led by Principal Investigators Christopher L. Warren and Mary S. Ozers to address critical bottlenecks in natural product discovery. The ClusterBuild platform combines DNA microarray technology with peptide nucleic acid (PNA)-based error correction and isothermal assembly to enable high-fidelity synthesis of DNA constructs up to 100 kilobases—substantially larger than existing methods such as polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assembly, Golden Gate cloning, and solid-phase synthesis.

The project delivers two primary technical deliverables: Aim 1 demonstrates the use of PNA microarrays to purify high-fidelity oligonucleotides generated from commercial DNA microarrays using sequence-specific melting temperature elution, while Aim 2 verifies efficient assembly of purified DNA oligonucleotides into a 12 kilobase biosynthetic gene cluster using barcoded, overlapping oligonucleotides and multi-stage isothermal assembly. These capabilities are intended to unlock therapeutic potential of natural products derived from unculturable microbes and advance the development of next-generation antibiotics by reducing cost, labor intensity, and time requirements compared to conventional DNA synthesis methods.