Engineered Yeast Could Enable the Efficient Production of Pure Cannabinoids

Intrexon, a leader in the engineering and industrialization of biology to improve the quality of life and health of the planet, has announced advances in the development of its microbial platform to produce cannabinoids for medical uses.  Through Intrexon's proprietary technologies, the company has engineered a yeast strain to produce low-cost, robust and consistent cannabinoid outputs via fermentation.  This process utilizing microbes has the potential to provide greater supply-chain security and avoids the resource-intensive isolation that often leads to quality and quantity variability in end products.

Further, this versatile strain was designed to enable the production of cannabinoids that only are produced today in minuscule amounts in cannabis plants as well as novel cannabinoids.  The company has scaled the process and achieved titers approaching commercially relevant targets with anticipated production of pure cannabinoids at COGS <$1,000/kg.

"As with some of our other similar projects, in thebaine, for example, microbial fermentation routes to produce cannabinoids provide advantages over traditional plant-based extraction," said Chris Savile, PhD, Executive Director, Commercial Operations.  "Through our capabilities and experience, we expect to optimize strains to produce specific cannabinoids that may be commercialized in the coming years