Davis Ag-tech Startup To Launch Nematodes Into Space

Source: Sacramento Business Journal, Mark Anderson
Photo: An effort called “Nematodes in Space!” will help Pheronym understand nematodes’ biological functioning on Earth, and potentially help astronauts feed themselves in future space missions. (Courtesy of Fatma Kaplan)

Davis soil-science startup Pheronym Inc. will test its biological pest controls in orbit later this year as part of a mission on the International Space Station.

The research will help Pheronym understand nematodes’, or roundworms’, biological functioning on Earth, and potentially help astronauts feed themselves in future space missions.

The space effort is also garnering attention for the small company, which is currently housed in the UC Davis-HM.CLAUSE Life Science Innovation Center in Davis. The space station effort has a Twitter handle, its own website and an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign.

“I have mostly been working in science, and I never appreciated marketing that much until I started a startup in 2017,” said Fatma Kaplan, Pheronym’s CEO.

She said when she previously described her business of microbes in soil science to non-scientists, people would tune out mid-sentence.

That’s not been the case with “Nematodes in Space!,” which is her space station project in conjunction with U.S. Department of Agriculture.

“Often, when we do science, it is not accessible to the public, but this research — because of the space station — is very interesting to the public,” Kaplan said.

The work will be sent to the International Space Station this fall to study the effects of zero-gravity on microscopic beneficial roundworms. Roundworms eat destructive insects in the soil that eat plant roots.

On earth, the roundworms move using gravity. The space test will see if they can move through the soil without gravity. Additionally, the research will see whether roundworms receive pheromones’ signals once they are in a host cadaver to move to find another insect host.

Pheromones produced by nematodes signal them to disperse and infect new insects. Pheronym’s technology uses pheromones to control the nematodes. Studying nematodes in low gravity may show new pheromone production mechanisms to improve Pheronym’s product formulation for Earth soil, Kaplan said.

As one of its long-term goals, NASA is investigating how to go to — and possibly colonize — Mars and the moon. To make that possible, astronauts will have to grow their own food in a sustainable way, Kaplan said.

Her company’s effort was given priority on the space station research mission because it also has immediate Earth applications, she said.

Pheronym received a $100,000 grant to do the space mission, which will go on regardless of how much the company raises with its Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign. The $40,000 crowdfunding goal is to pay the scientists’ salaries during the space experiment.

Pheronym’s main funding so far has been a $500,000 grant from the USDA, according to Crunchbase.

https://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/news/2019/02/26/davis-ag-techstartup-to-launch-nematodes-into