the gene into cultured cells. If the scientists have done their job right, the inserted genetic instructions program the organisms to begin producing the proteins.
Algae, however, doesn’t require the big fermenting containers and other expensive machinery used by big drug companies.
Triton says its first product is a protein called Mammary Associated Amyloid (MMA), which is normally produced in the colostrum and stimulates the production of mucus coating along the inner walls of the digestive tract. A statement from the company says the protein “is known to prevent the colonization of pathogenic bacteria that would result in the onset of diarrheal diseases.”
Triton said its first product will be synthetic MMA, expected to be commercially available in 2014. The company says MMA “has the potential to address diarrheal diseases worldwide, which account for over two million human deaths each year, are the leading cause of infant mortality, and kill approximately 20 percent of the world’s livestock.”
Triton also has been developing products that could be used to treat cancer, an approach Mayfield outlined for Xconomy in 2009.
Triton says proteins produced using its PhycoLogix process will be used in pharmaceuticals, neutraceuticals, cosmetics, and human and animal health and nutrition products.
Author: Bruce V. Bigelow
In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here.
Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University.
Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.
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