Automation and Digitalisation Technology for Evolutionary Development of Microbial Chassis

The biomanufacturing industry needs fit-for-purpose, market-ready microbial chassis that are pre-optimized for large-scale biomanufacturing of commodity products that are competitively viable against existing markets and embrace circularity in their supply chains. As biomanufacturing sectors expand rapidly towards 2030, this need cannot be satisfied by existing microbe development technologies that are restricted by the relatively minimal genetic understanding of non-model microbial systems.

At Evolutor, we use our Accelerated Evolution Platform (AEP) to digitalise, amplify and rapidly accelerate adaptive laboratory evolution (ALE) to address this unmet need. Evolutor’s AEP is an integrated suite of platform technologies made up of: • Novel miniature bioreactor hardware, including advanced sensing tools and evolutionary stress controllers.

• Software for evolutionary control, forecast and modelling.

• Proprietary genetic tools to unlock the hidden biological potential of non-model microbes and massively amplify their evolutionary potential.

Evolutor’s long-term ambition is to build Galapagos Towers: a world-leading and paradigm-shifting bio-foundry in the North of England which unlocks 24/7 massively parallel and fully automated ALE at a globally unprecedented scale. This will be achieved through 1000s of AEP units all managed through proprietary software and generative AI.

Through Galapagos Towers, we will develop a diverse library of precision-evolved microbial chassis pre-optimized for large-scale circular biomanufacturing use across all sectors. Additionally, the vast amounts of evolutionary data generated will unlock development of generative AI models for predictive evolution to take ALE in silico and perpetually widen our global competitive moats.

Overall, the Galapagos Towers vision will drive a Bio-Industrial Revolution of sustainable and circular manufacturing across all industries.

To reach this ambition, Evolutor is beginning with targeted deployment of the unscaled AEP technology to solve a specific biomanufacturing problem: the inability of model microbial chassis systems to effectively utilise wastestream-derived feedstocks. It’s estimated that to realise the full potential of Bio-Industrial Revolution using virgin sugar feedstock would require 3 x current global commodity crop production.

Alongside this, we are producing up to 10 billion tonnes of solid waste every year (UN Environment Programme). Using the AEP, Evolutor are developing waste-hungry microbes to address these 2 commercial and environmental problems. The first targeted waste is end-of-life tyres (ELTs).

Through this project, Evolutor is iterating the hardware of its AEP for increased functionality and scalability before demonstrating it with proof-of-concept microbe evolution by evolving non-model microbes for rapid degradation of ELTs. These precision-evolved microbes will unlock a significant wastestream for use as fermentation feedstock in biomaterial production.