SBIR-STTR Award

The R&D goal is to secure water from renewable sources for water stressed regions. The R&D is to increase overall collection of water from fog by one order of magnitude compared to fog net water collectors (FNC). FNC collects fog water micro-droplets by impact on a net matrix. Its water collection efficiency WCE is...

Foresight Science & Technology Inc. (Foresight) and the USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) are collaborating in the development and commercialization of a novel new bait formulation to control the spread of red imported fire ants (RIFA) utilizing patented peptides asan effective environmentally neutral species-specific active ingredient for a bait formulation. The project is based on two issued patents US Patent 9771393 B2. Bioactive Peptides Having Insecticide Activity Choi and Vander Meer issued Sep. 26 2017; US Patent 10017538. Bioactive Peptides Having Insecticide Activity Choi and Vander Meer issued Jul. 10 2018; and PCT WO 2016/0262388 A1 and WO 2018/0086790 A1. The project will demonstrate the commercial potential for controlling RIFA using novel bioactive peptides as antagonists blocking essential RIFA receptors. Foresight and ARS have utilized USDA NIFA SBIR Phase I grant funding to screen patent protected synthetic peptides that showed promise in laboratory screening bioassays and to demonstrate proof of concept for use of specific peptides in a bait formulation. In Phase II the project will focus on developing an optimal bait formulation investigation of nano delivery and field testing to produce a prototype with supporting data. Commercialization will be through licensing the intellectual property and know-how to a private commercial entity for further product development and mass market distribution.