Developing Future Sustainable Materials Using AI with Cambrium

This week, we are pleased to be joined on the Data in Biotech Podcast by Pierre Salvy, who recently became the CTO at Cambrium, and his colleague Lucile Bonnin, Head of Research & Development at Cambrium. 

As part of the Cambrium team behind NovaColl™, the first micro-molecular and skin-identical vegan collagen to market, Pierre and Lucile share their practical experiences of using AI to support protein design.

We ask why Cambrium, as a molecular design organization, decided to focus on the cosmetics industry and dig into the factors that have driven its success. From developing a protein programming language to the challenges of collecting and utilizing lab data, Pierre and Lucile give a detailed look under the hood of a company using data and AI to accelerate its journey from start-up to scale-up.

They also talk to host Ross Katz about the benefits of working as a cloud-native company from day zero, de-risking the process of scaling, and opportunities for new biomaterials.   

Data in Biotech is a fortnightly podcast exploring how companies leverage data innovation in the life sciences. 

Chapter Markers

[1:34] Pierre and Lucile make a quick introduction and give an overview of Cambrium’s work using AI to design proteins with the aim of developing sustainable materials.

[4:00] Lucile introduces NovaColl™, and Pierre elaborates on the process of bringing Cambrium’s first product to market.

[7:37] Ross asks Pierre and Lucile to give an overview of the considerations and challenges of protein design.

[11:01] Pierre and Lucile explain how Cambrium works with potential customers to design specific proteins that meet or exceed their expectations.

[12:49] Ross and Pierre discuss how Cambrium approached developing the data systems it needed to explore the protein landscape and how the team optimized the lab set-up.

[18:04] Pierre discusses the protein programming language developed at Cambrium.

[21:24] Lucile and Pierre talk through the development of the data platform at Cambrium as the company has scaled and the value of being cloud-native.

[24:12] Lucile and Pierre discuss how they approached designing the manufacturing process from scratch and how to reduce risk at every stage, especially while scaling up.  

[31:44] The conversation moves to look at how Cambrium will use the processes and data platform developed with NovaColl™ to explore opportunities for the development of new biomaterials. 

[34:42] Pierre gives advice on how start-ups can be smarter when selecting an area of focus.

[36:27] Lucile emphasizes the importance of getting cross-organizational buy-in to ensure successful data capture. 

[39:01] Pierre and Lucile recommend resources that may be of interest to listeners seeking more information on the topics covered. 

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