Professor Kim Jaeyeon of Gyeongsang National University Challenges Startup in Next-Generation Crop Gene Editing Technology

Plant Life Biotechnology Institute's First Plant-Related Researcher Startup

Using Gene Editing, Aspiring to Be a Global Leader in Precision Crop Breeding Technology

Professor Kim Jaeyeon.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Choi Soon-kyung] Gyeongsang National University announced on the 30th that Professor Kim Jae-yeon of the Department of Life Sciences, College of Natural Sciences (Plant Life Biotechnology Research Institute, Graduate School of Applied Life Sciences) has founded the crop-specialized gene editing startup company Nulra Bio and plans to enter the global stage through the industrialization of crop gene editing.

The Ministry of Science and ICT supports Nulra Bio through the Research Industry Promotion Project, and the Ministry of SMEs and Startups supports it through the early commercialization support program.

Professor Kim Jae-yeon, a core researcher at the Plant Life Biotechnology Research Institute, has been steadily developing crop gene editing-based and applied technologies through the Korea Research Foundation-supported basic research laboratory project for crop genome editing, the Korea Research Foundation-supported bio-medical technology development project (next-generation precision breeding technology development), and the Rural Development Administration's next-generation major crop new breeding technology development project.

Domestically, Professor Kim has published numerous papers related to crop gene editing technology innovation and new crop breeding. Additionally, she has filed many patents related to these topics in Korea, the United States, Canada, and China, accumulating competitiveness.

In academic activities, Professor Kim founded the New Breeding Innovation Technology Research Association in 2019, composed of domestic industry-academia researchers engaged in gene editing and new breeding fields, serving as the inaugural president and developing leadership.

Furthermore, Professor Kim's research team is conducting close research cooperation with the recently selected priority research institute and the Anti-Aging Biomaterial Cell Factory Regional Innovation Research Center.

The business that Nulra Bio is focusing on is the development of cannabinoid materials from hemp, which is experiencing a hot trend called the Green Rush, mainly in advanced countries such as the United States.

Cannabinoid materials are high-value substances actively researched as new drug candidate materials with various functions including health benefits, anticancer, immune, and neuroprotection.

The research team is developing a triple-benefit production technology that improves productivity, product safety, and production stability by genetically editing marijuana hemp with high psychoactive THC content to disable THC production and instead enhance the accumulation of health-beneficial materials cannabidiol (CBD) and cannabigerol (CBG) in hemp crops.

The global market for hemp and cannabinoids is expected to reach 120 trillion won within the next eight years.

Gene editing technology, which won the Nobel Prize in 2020, is a highly impactful technology and a new industry field that has created many startups such as Intellia Therapeutics and CRISPR Therapeutics with market capitalizations reaching 10 trillion won.

In Korea, ToolGen has secured the original CRISPR technology, but domestic startups specialized only in crop gene editing are very limited.

The Plant Life Biotechnology Research Institute at Gyeongsang National University was established in 1990 and conducted the first excellent research center (SRC) project supported by the Korea Research Foundation.

It has also led the domestic plant life science and plant biotechnology research fields through numerous nationally designated research labs, national core research center projects, the World Class University program, the Rural Development Administration-supported next-generation BioGreen21 project, the Systems Synthetic Agricultural Biotechnology Project Group, regional innovation research centers, and priority research institutes. This is the first time related research has been connected to startup creation, and it is expected to serve as a milestone for generating similar commercialization cases in the future.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.