February 15th, 2023, Vancouver, British Columbia – Anodyne has been granted funding by The National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC-IRAP) to build out its digital enzyme capabilities.
With this grant funding, Anodyne will be able to expand its digital enzyme capabilities, which will enable the company to create engineered enzymes to meet the unique needs of its customers.
Anodyne’s technology platform develops enzymes to replace processes with a high environmental footprint – optimizing naturally occurring enzymes and designing new versions of enzymes with unique benefits. This allows Anodyne to build the chemicals we rely on in a way that was not previously possible and replace environmentally damaging feedstocks, like petroleum or palm oil, with environmentally positive feedstocks like captured CO2.
This new capability is only now possible thanks in large part to advances in the simulation and computational design of enzymes (“digital enzymes”). Molecular simulations and modelling are at the forefront of changing the science of enzymology, where calculations can provide detailed, atomic-level insights into the fundamental mechanisms of biocatalysts. Computational enzymology is a rapidly developing area, challenging long-held theories of catalysis and identifying novel catalytic mechanisms. Increasingly, simulation and modelling are being used to massively reduce the cost and time it takes to develop new engineered enzymes that can outperform their natural counterparts and compete with conventional industrial processes.
“Enzymes have a number of extraordinary properties that allows them to carry out complex processes with extreme precision and efficiency. Because of these properties, enzymes are being exploited for a large number of applications in industry. To apply these properties to traditional high emitting sectors, protein engineering and computational enzyme design will help us create the most efficient and robust biocatalysts, enabling high conversion efficiencies and long lifetimes.” said Manou Davies, CSO of Anodyne Chemistries.
“We see tremendous opportunity to compliment Anodyne’s key capabilities in synthetic biology and electrochemistry, with computational enzymology and molecular simulation to bring new, impactful enzymes to market across a number of industries,” said Iain Evans, CEO at Anodyne. “At Anodyne, we are looking to discover and drive forward disruptive chemistries through the use of simulation technologies. Together we believe this gives us the best chance to tackle large industrial challenges and help define the fuels, materials and consumer products of the future. It’s at the intersection of chemistry and simulation where we see the greatest opportunities for disruption.”
About Anodyne Chemistries Ltd.
Anodyne is a Canadian Startup with the vision to make the chemical industry sustainable by harnessing the potential of enzymes. Anodyne’s enzymatic platform is created through a pioneering approach that combines the evolutionary advantages of biology with the efficiencies of the chemical industry. By transitioning from fossil to fossil-free manufacturing, they seek to play a key role in solving one of the grand challenges of our time – how to produce affordable, sustainable products that we use every day.
Anodyne strives to build the industry’s leading chemical technology platform, the infrastructure to accelerate scale-up, a rapidly expanding pipeline, and a world-class team. Anodyne’s pipeline includes development candidates for fuels, polymers, food additives and pharmaceutical ingredients, and they have multiple trials underway with other development candidates. In addition, Anodyne has initiated discovery programs with leading research universities, expanding the potential impact of our technologies.