Ventria Bioscience is a biotech company with a focus on human nutrition and human therapeutics. The company was established in 1993. The company's core technology is a plant-based

Pharming (genetics)

Pharming is a portmanteau of farming and "pharmaceutical" and refers to the use of genetic engineering to insert genes that code for useful pharmaceuticals into host animals or plants that would otherwise not express those genes. As a consequence, the host animals or plants then make the...

 protein

Protein

Proteins are biochemical compounds consisting of one or more polypeptides typically folded into a globular or fibrous form, facilitating a biological function. A polypeptide is a single linear polymer chain of amino acids bonded together by peptide bonds between the carboxyl and amino groups of...

 production

Protein expression

Protein expression is a subcomponent of gene expression. It consists of the stages after DNA has been translated into polypeptide chains, which are ultimately folded into proteins...

 system called ExpressTec. Ventria's product pipeline is based on recombinant

Recombinant DNA

Recombinant DNA molecules are DNA sequences that result from the use of laboratory methods to bring together genetic material from multiple sources, creating sequences that would not otherwise be found in biological organisms...

 lactoferrin

Lactoferrin

Lactoferrin , also known as lactotransferrin , is a multifunctional protein of the transferrin family. Lactoferrin is a globular glycoprotein with a molecular mass of about 80 kDa that is widely represented in various secretory fluids, such as milk, saliva, tears, and nasal secretions...

 and lysozyme

Lysozyme

Lysozyme, also known as muramidase or N-acetylmuramide glycanhydrolase, are glycoside hydrolases, enzymes that damage bacterial cell walls by catalyzing hydrolysis of 1,4-beta-linkages between N-acetylmuramic acid and N-acetyl-D-glucosamine residues in a peptidoglycan and between...

 for use in medical food

Medical food

Medical foods are foods that are specially formulated and intended for the dietary management of a disease that has distinctive nutritional needs that cannot be met by normal diet alone...

s, bioprocessing, cell culture

Cell culture

Cell culture is the complex process by which cells are grown under controlled conditions. In practice, the term "cell culture" has come to refer to the culturing of cells derived from singlecellular eukaryotes, especially animal cells. However, there are also cultures of plants, fungi and microbes,...

 and as a topical anti-infective. These proteins show promise as a supplement to oral rehydration therapy

Oral rehydration therapy

Oral rehydration therapy is a simple treatment for dehydration associated with diarrhoea, particularly gastroenteritis or gastroenteropathy, such as that caused by cholera or rotavirus. ORT consists of a solution of salts and sugars which is taken by mouth...

 and to treat C.difficile infection because they inhibit C.difficile, but promote the growth of healthy gut flora

Gut flora

Gut flora consists of microorganisms that live in the digestive tracts of animals and is the largest reservoir of human flora. In this context, gut is synonymous with intestinal, and flora with microbiota and microflora....

. Ventria invites other researchers to have access to its recombinant human lactoferrin and recombinant human lysozyme through a program called BioShare. The Company has operations in Kansas, North Carolina, California, and Colorado. The company recently completed construction of a bioprocessing facility in Kansas.

Regulatory Advantages

ExpressTec uses self-pollinating crops such as rice

Rice

Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima . As a cereal grain, it is the most important staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and the West Indies...

 and barley

Barley

Barley is a major cereal grain, a member of the grass family. It serves as a major animal fodder, as a base malt for beer and certain distilled beverages, and as a component of various health foods...

 to minimize the risk of gene flow

Gene flow

In population genetics, gene flow is the transfer of alleles of genes from one population to another.Migration into or out of a population may be responsible for a marked change in allele frequencies...

 normally associated with transgenic plants. Plant-produced proteins also offer advantages for cell culture and bioprocessing use because they replace animal derived components, which have become unpopular due to concerns about prion

Prion

A prion is an infectious agent composed of protein in a misfolded form. This is in contrast to all other known infectious agents which must contain nucleic acids . The word prion, coined in 1982 by Stanley B. Prusiner, is a portmanteau derived from the words protein and infection...

 contamination. The use of food crops also allows for slightly less stringent purity standards when the product is processed for oral consumption.

Bioprocessing facility in Kansas

On September 29, 2006, Kansas officials announced an agreement to bring Ventria’s new bioprocessing facility to Junction City, Kansas

Junction City, Kansas

Junction City is a city in and the county seat of Geary County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 23,353. Fort Riley, a major U.S. Army post, is nearby...

. Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius

Kathleen Sebelius

Kathleen Sebelius is an American politician currently serving as the 21st Secretary of Health and Human Services. She was the second female Governor of Kansas from 2003 to 2009, the Democratic respondent to the 2008 State of the Union address, and chair-emerita of the Democratic Governors...

 was very supportive of the agreement and was quoted as stating "I welcome Ventria Bioscience to Kansas and look forward to their contributions to the health of children worldwide." The effort to attract Ventria to Kansas involved a number of players, including Governor Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Agriculture, Adrian Polansky, The Kansas Department of Commerce, Junction City and Geary County, Kansas Technology Enterprise Corporation (KTEC), KansasBIO, Kansas State University

Kansas State University

Kansas State University, commonly shortened to K-State, is an institution of higher learning located in Manhattan, Kansas, in the United States...

, and Kansas Farm Bureau.

In February, 2007, the results of a new study found that electrolyte solution, incorporating Ventria’s products, helped children recover faster from diarrhea. The study was published in the February issue of the Journal of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition, a leading medical journal. The results showed that the children receiving Ventria’s product recovered 30% faster, were more likely to recover from their diarrhea and were less likely to relapse into another episode. Ventria’s product comprises two proteins found naturally in breast milk. In the United States, there are more than 1.5 million hospital visits for childhood diarrhea. Globally, childhood diarrhea is the second leading killer of children under the age of 5, claiming 2 million lives annually.

Markets and products

Ventria has commercialized nine products and is targeting three markets:

• Human Health
• Cell-based biomanufacturing
• Zoonotic disease

External links

• Ventria Bioscience Official site