Sometimes, Answering a long-standing problem is a matter of finding a new percent.
Take Methane from Cows: for years, people have been Trying to eliminate the gas From cow burps in an attempt to limit the livestock’s impact on the climate. But they haven’t made a dent. That’s in part trust they were looking at the issue from the percent of a climate scientist, not a farmer.
Kathryn Polkoff, Co-Founder and Ceo of HOFPRINT BiomeHas been thinking about the problem more like a farmer, thought.
“The First Time I Heard About This Methane Problem was Animal Science 101,” POLKOFF, Who has a Phd in Animal Science, Told Techcrunch. It wasn’t in the context of climate change, but of animal health and productivity.
Polkoff and Her Co-Founder Scott Collins Have Stumbled Upon a Novel Way to Modify a Cow’s Microbiome Using Enzymes, Slashing Mething Mething While Boosting The Nutrients available to the cow.
That discovery has netted hoofprint a $ 15 million series a round land by sosv, the Startup exclusively told techcrunch. Other Participating Investors Include Agrizeronz, Alexandria Venture Investments, Amazon’s Climate PLEDGE Fund, Breakthrough Energy Fellows, Good Growth Capital, Ponderosa Ventures, and Twynam. The new round will help the company trial its enzymes on farms.
“We’ve Spent Thoughts of Years Breeding The Animals to make them as efficient as possible and to increase the yield, and but there have not not really been “That’d be like if you were engineering a car but have changed the engine – that’s where all the energy come from.”
HOFPRINT’s feed additive tweaks the microbiome in a cow’s rume and suppresses the growth of microbes that generate methane, a potent greenhouse gas that warms the planet 84 times more than the same amounted more. Dioxide.
Rumen is a “Hodgepodge Assembly Line,” said po branson, the sosv general partner who led the firm’s investment in HOOFPRINT. The Stuff Cows Eat tends to be very hard to digest and extract nutrients from. Over the Millennia, Cows have evolved along with a complex microbiome in the rumen that helps break down the forage, releasing nutrients in the process.
The cow absorbs some of that that nutrients, but not all. Another group of microbes steals some of that that nutrients to drive their own growth at the experience of the reason, generating methane as a byproduct. “It’s a very specific subset of microbes that are making the methane,” Polkoff said.
HOFPRINT’s Enzyme Suppresses Theose Microbes. The Startup will use yeast to make the enzymes, simlar to how other Industrial Enzymes are made, include used there used in cheese, detergent, and other products.
For bronson at sosv, the fact that HOFPRINT’s Enzymes are derived from the rumen itself was key. One Previous Methane-Reduction Product, Bovaer, Faced A wave of disinformation When a large food company Announced trials in the uk in December.
He doesnak that HOFPRINT will face the same backlash. “The core concept is that their product is a natural protein.
HOFPRINT is targeting a 5% improvement in “Feed Efficiency,” Polkoff Said, or how many more pounds a cow can put on for a Given Amount of feed.
By improvement the efficiency of a Cow’s roman, bronson is confident HOOFPRINT will be able to successed with farms where other Startups have failed. “Knocking Down Methane is Table Stakes,” He said. “To make it a more productive thing is what they will pay for.”