01 // Mission
Why we search natural extremophiles
Industrial biotechnology often attempts to engineer domesticated lab microbes (like E. coli and yeast) to survive harsh industrial conditions. But over 99% of microbial life cannot be cultured on standard agar plates. In hydrothermal vents, subzero sea ice, and hypersaline lakes, extremophiles already evolved the exact catalytic stability industry needs. We mine these natural sequences computationally to find robust, proven enzymes.
The Cultivation Trap
Domesticated Strains Stall
Lab-adapted strains require years of costly mutagenesis ($3M–$5M per project) and frequently misfold or aggregate in industrial fermenters when exposed to non-physiological conditions.
The Metagenomic Solution
Natural Evolutionary Fitness
By computationally querying global environmental metagenomes, we discover enzymes that already evolved industrial tolerance, preserving native quaternary assemblies and secretion signals.
02 // Studio Model
Pure-play computational IP studio
DarkBiome operates as a lean discovery studio with zero wet-lab leases or robotics overhead. All candidate mining, structural alignment, and explicit-solvent molecular dynamics run in-house. When partners evaluate leads, bilateral option fees directly fund certified commercial CROs (Twist Bioscience, GenScript, Charles River Laboratories) to synthesize purified biocatalyst for blinded testing on partner feedstocks.
Cost structure: conventional biotech versus DarkBiome
Conventional Wet-Lab Model
- × $20M–$50M upfront: Spent on physical labs and robotics
- × $500k+ monthly overhead: Facility rent and bench salaries
- × 2–3 years per lead: Slow cycles of random mutagenesis
- × Inventory risk: Protein batches degrading in freezers
DarkBiome Studio Model
- ✓ Zero wet-lab overhead: Pure computational screening
- ✓ Compute efficiency: Local edge triage (<10W) on Apple Silicon
- ✓ Customer-funded testing: Option fees cover custom CRO synthesis
- ✓ On-demand material: Protein synthesized fresh for partner trials
STAGE 01 • EVALUATION OPTION
Bilateral CDA / MTA & CRO Synthesis
6–12 month exclusive option window. Option fees fund certified CRO synthesis (50–250 mg) for blinded testing on partner feedstocks. 100% credited toward commercial license.
STAGE 02 • COMMERCIAL OUT-LICENSE
Field-Exclusive Worldwide Rights
Standardized commercial license terms: $500k–$750k upfront (minus option credit), $1.25M–$2.0M in development milestones, and a 4.0%–5.0% running royalty on commercial production.
03 // Leadership & Governance
Founder and Governance
SG
Steven Glenn
Founder & Principal
Alameda, California
Steven Glenn is a systems engineer and computational biophysicist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. He founded DarkBiome to discover industrial biocatalysts by coupling large-scale metagenomic mining with explicit-solvent biophysical simulation.
He architected the platform's high-throughput screening and validation engines—indexing over 16.6 million candidate sequences across 35 discovery targets and resolving nearly 1 million structural models. He is the sole inventor across DarkBiome's priority patent applications filed with the USPTO.
“Nature spent four billion years running planetary R&D. We just need the compute to find what already works.”
Corporate Structure
Delaware LLC
DarkBiome LLC is organized as a Delaware limited liability company based in Alameda, California. IP assets are cleanly held within the operating entity.
Patent Filings
USPTO Priority Filings
Priority patent applications covering novel sequence compositions, multimers, and functional applications are filed before sharing data with commercial partners.
Origin Provenance
Clean Public Provenance
Every candidate sequence traces to public environmental repositories (NCBI, ENA, JGI) with complete sample locations, biome metadata, and contig checksums.
Out-licensing and diligence
Start an evaluation
Review candidate dossiers, explore our discovery pipeline, or discuss confidential evaluation under a bilateral Delaware CDA.
