April 25, 2023: BioTork Announces New Focus on Non-Fossil-based Fertilizer: Over 250 MMT of nitrogen fertilizers are produced globally every year, raking in over $70 bn in revenues. The vast majority of fertilizers use NH₃ produced through the Haber-Bosch process, which is used to produce 150 MMT of NH₃ annually and is largely credited with our ability to feed the world’s growing population. However, the Haber-Bosch process requires energy in the form of natural gas, the price of which has increased greatly due to geopolitical turbulence. Indeed, the price of fertilizer has increased significantly recently, resulting is high food prices. Moreover, natural gas is a fossil fuel, meaning fertilizer production is a significant contributor to climate change. Atmospheric nitrogen can also be fixed by microorganisms using an enzyme call nitrogenase. BioTork is embarking on a development program to improve nitrogen fixation by diazotrophic bacteria with the goal of making fertilizer production via microorganisms more cost competitive with the Haber-Bosch process.

February 20, 2022: BioTork Improves Omega-3-producing Alga Strain: Omega-3fatty acids are a critical component of a healthy diet. They play an important role in the prevention of aging. That said, omega-3s are either sourced from unsustainable wild caught fish stock or they are extracted from algae grown in fermenters. Despite years of developing fermenter grown algae (heterotrophs) or photosynthesis-based grown algae (phototrophs), there is little affordable algal DHA product on the market. The reason is simple: costs are too high.  BioTork has been developing cell lines of fermenter-grown algae that hyperproduce omega-3 fatty acids like DHA from low cost agro-industrial feedstocks like molasses in simple inexpensive fermentation conditions. There is tremendous potential value for this strain, however, it still needs to be vetted at the pre-commercial scale.