AvidBiotics and DuPont to Collaborate on Food Safety Applications

AvidBiotics Corp. and DuPont Nutrition & Health

today announced a collaboration aimed at significantly improving food safety. The agreement, which includes a DuPont Ventures equity investment, gives DuPont worldwide, exclusive rights to AvidBiotics' antibacterial protein technology in the broad realm of food and food protection. AvidBiotics retains all rights to applications of its technology in the fields of animal health, human therapeutics, human prophylactics and human diagnostics. “As a global leader in the field of food science and safety, DuPont is an ideal partner to help us realize the full potential of our Purocin™ antibacterial protein technology for food-related applications,” said James L. Knighton, President of AvidBiotics, Inc. “This collaboration provides us with the needed resources to advance our efforts against the most important food-borne pathogens, the seriousness of which as a health threat is only compounded by the increasing resistance of many of these organisms to antibiotics. Along with DuPont, we will continue to advance our most immediate product opportunity in food protection against E. coli 0157:H7.