Bloom®

Implementing sustainable, organism specific chitinase-based solutions to mitigate the effects of toxic pesticides and curb global food insecurity.

824 million die from the effects of food insecurity annually, and recent developments in agriculture, namely synthetic pesticides, have led to increased crop yields to cope with rising population levels. 

But these pesticides aren't as effective as they used to be, and even lead to harms on human health and the environment, ultimately leading to lower crop yields in the long run. 

Traditional pesticides, made up of known Group 1 Level Carcinogens like arsenic, ethylene oxide, and lindane, cause a multitude of illnesses in general populations. Cancer, asthma, ADHD, depression, anxiety, and Parkinson's disease are all directly linked to pesticide exposure. Pesticide exposure doesn't just mean applying pesticides with your own hands. Consuming or handling any produce grown using pesticides is considered exposure. Even removing foods grown with pesticides from your diet doesn’t mean you’re not being exposed. The high prevalence of pesticide pollution in our environments causes almost constant exposure for almost every human on the planet.

"No segment of the population is completely protected against exposure to pesticides and the potentially serious health effects, though a disproportionate burden, is shouldered by the people of developing countries." - National Library of Medicine

Pesticides can remain in soil systems for upwards of 15 years, and in aquatic systems for up to 150 years, leading to destabilization of ecosystems due to their unintended effects on non-target organisms, often ones that are actually beneficial for crop production. Essential insects, vegetation, and microorganisms are killed by the over application of pesticides, which ultimately leads to soil infertility, decreasing crop yields in the long run, directly fueling the issue that pesticides were created to prevent. 

“Overuse of chemical fertilizers and pesticides have effects on the soil organisms that are similar to human overuse of antibiotics. Indiscriminate use of chemicals might work for a few years, but after awhile, there aren't enough beneficial soil organisms to hold onto the nutrients.” - Dr Elaine Ingham

Bloom® is developing non-toxic and organism specific alternatives to pesticides. 

To do this, we utilize an enzyme called chitinase. Chitinase is naturally found in organisms such as plants, bacteria, fungi and insects. Its main function is to break down chitin, the second most abundant natural polysaccharide and the building material for structural components of pests and phytopathogens, like exoskeletons and cells. 

When you break down the structural components of such organisms, they are easily eliminated. By using this methodology on pests and phytopathogens, this primary source of crop failure can be mitigated. Crucially, chitinase doesn’t target any form of chitin. You need a specific chitinase for a specific chitin. This makes it completely safe for the environment by eliminating the possibility of killing any non-target organisms like necessary microorganisms, vegetation, and animals. 

Because humans do not contain chitin, our solution is not harmful to humans. In addition, chitinase is non-toxic, and the non-toxic byproduct created by its reaction with chitin (chitooligosaccharides) has antimicrobial, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, immunostimulating, antitumor, hypocholesterolemic properties, and improves iron and calcium absorption, which can further help with strengthening crop production.

Our solution is geared towards farmers, agricultural workers, and ultimately everyone who consumes farm produced crops.

By providing a non-toxic alternative to pesticides, we’re going to be heavily reducing the amount of illnesses caused by pesticide application. 

We’ll also be directly addressing food insecurity by creating more effective organism-specific biocontrols, creating a better quality of life by providing food that is desperately needed.

Agriculture is in our blood.

Our family's roots are in farming, so we have all familiarized ourselves with the field since we were young, leading us to pursue opportunities to enrich our knowledge about this industry. 

I've worked with the Red Cross, running my region's Environmental Campaigns for this year's International Humanitarian Law Advocacy Program, so I've been able to learn the needs of those suffering from the effects of food insecurity, and how agriculture ties into what we need to do to try to solve such vexing issues. 

We come from generations of farmers, so agriculture is something we hold dearly. This has translated over perfectly, so we understand the mindsets and the core needs of farmers, especially farmers in developing countries. 

To further improve our solution our team is currently:

1. Researching the current state of pesticide use and contamination in agriculture, as well as the effects on both farmers and consumers.

2. Consulting with experts in the field, including farmers, agricultural scientists, and environmental health specialists.

3. Conducting surveys and interviews with farmers and other stakeholders to gather firsthand information about their experiences, challenges and needs.

4. Analyzing existing data on food insecurity and pesticide exposure, in order to understand the potential impact of my solution on both issues.

5. Attending relevant conferences, workshops and events to stay up to date on the latest research, trends, and best practices in sustainable agriculture.

We've found a revolutionary way to leverage naturally occurring phenomena, like chitinase, in order to create equitable large-scale impact. 

Our novel research and work with chitinase required innovation in the field, as we've had to identify non-toxic cross linkers using GROMACS simulations in a way that no other groups had done so before, which will most likely lead to other biocontrol companies utilizing our approach to leverage naturally occuring chemicals to create alternatives to pesticides. 

This approach may even lead to an overhaul of the market, as almost all traditional pesticides may be altered to be organism specific, and have their composition changed to be made up of enzymes.

Our impact goals are to:

1. Collaborate with AgEI, and other agriculturally focused organizations in order to find more non-toxic cross linkers and develop a better product.

2. Create better connections with policymakers, and shareholders in the agricultural, pesticide, and biocontrol industry.

3. Gain more capital through backing from organizations like Civics Unplugged, SBIR, and GenGeo, so we can do more field research to better know our customer-base.

We utilize an enzyme called chitinase. 

Chitinase is naturally found in organisms such as plants, bacteria, fungi and insects. Its main function is to break down chitin, the second most abundant natural polysaccharide and the building material for the exoskeletons and cells of pests and pathogens.

To be able to use chitinase, our team uses GROMACS molecular dynamics simulations and DBSCAN, a machine learning tool, to find non-toxic cross linkers, which immobilize chitinase and enhance catalyitic activity. 

By breaking down these structural components of pests and pathogens using immobolized chitinase, you eliminate the main causes of crop failure, and in turn food insecurity. 

And crucially, chitinase doesn’t target any form of chitin. You need a specific chitinase for a specific chitin. This eliminates the possibility of killing any non-target organisms like necessary microorganisms, vegetation, and animals. 

Humans do not contain chitin, so our solutions are completely safe.

Currently, we don't directly sell our chitinase-based solutions, but our research and methodology has had an impact on researchers and other institutions trying to create more sustainable agricultural practices, with 7 outside researchers reviewing and using our findings. 

For the future we want to impact 30 farmers, which may seem like a little, but the trickle down makes the amount of people fed using our technology almost 5,000 people.

We haven't found all of the non-toxic cross linkers that we have wanted using GROMACS simulations and DBSCAN yet, which may inhibit our progress in developing our chitinase-based solutions to the level we want it at.

We have to give credit to Civics Unplugged for providing us with much of the inspiration, as well as the tools to be able to participate in this competition.

Our model is catered towards large and small scale farmers alike. Depending on their needs, our chitinase-based solutions can be altered so that they have the most cost-efficient and successful crop yields. 

We plan to sell to our customer-base and deliver our product before each planting season. We are continuing to improve this model, so when it's launched globally, we can have the best relationship with our customer base.

Our path to sustainability is to achieve more grants and series-1 funding from the LCOY-UN, NatGeo, BlueHaven, Big Green, and Civics Unplugged in combination with scaling our launched planting-season based business model to be able to create a sustainable and safe solution to food insecurity.