Resurrect Bio, a Norwich‑based ag‑biotech spun out of The Sainsbury Laboratory, is developing disease‑resistant crops by “resurrecting” native plant immune genes that have been suppressed over time by pathogens. Using gene editing and its proprietary AI platform, FloraFold®, the company aims to offer seed firms a sustainable alternative to chemical crop protection by enabling crops to defend themselves naturally.
Founded by Professors Sophien Kamoun and Tolga Bozkurt, and CEO Dr. Cian Duggan, Resurrect Bio recently closed the initial phase of its $8.1 million Series A, led by Corteva’s Catalyst platform alongside Calculus Capital, Pymwymic, UKI2S, SynBioVen, and AgFunder. The raise aims to dramatically scale its high‑throughput discovery engine and accelerate multiple traits toward commercial licensing.
A platform built specifically for plant immunity
At the heart of Resurrect Bio’s competitive edge is its proprietary AI platform, FloraFold®, which predicts plant–pathogen protein interactions with far greater accuracy than general-purpose tools.
“Off‑the‑shelf models like AlphaFold [developed by Google DeepMind] are biased towards human biology,” CEO Dr. Cian Duggan told AgTechNavigator. “FloraFold® is specifically tailored to plants, plant pathogens and plant pests. This improves the accuracy of our predictions of protein-protein interactions, enabling us to better find pathogen and pest proteins which activate or suppress the plant immune system.”
Where FloraFold® stands apart from other AI‑led discovery platforms, Duggan added, is its integration with large‑scale wet‑lab validation. “Most AI-driven trait discovery companies don’t focus on generating wet lab data,” he said. “Our wet lab is the heart of our company – it validates the predictions from the dry lab and provides data for training FloraFold® AI.”
This combination of plant‑specific AI and in‑planta testing allows Resurrect Bio to determine which native resistance genes have been suppressed by pathogens and how they can be edited to restore robust immunity.
Target crops and priority diseases
While Duggan declined to specify which targets are being developed with Corteva, he revealed the company’s in‑house pipeline spans six major crops, with more to follow: soybean, corn, wheat, potato, tomato and spinach. The next wave will expand into cotton and canola.
The traits focus on conserved plant-pathogen and plant-pest interactions – enabling applicability across the germplasm of any seed company, not just Corteva. Although specific diseases were not disclosed, the platform is designed to tackle the most economically damaging pathogens in each crop by reviving immune receptors capable of delivering full, durable resistance.
Duggan is confident this approach produces “non‑breakable” resistance that can hold for five or more years before the next improved version is deployed.
“Pathogens and pests will always find ways around the immune system of plants, that’s the natural way,” he said. “It’s a co-evolutionary arms race. We’re just helping crops stay a couple of steps ahead of the pathogens.”
Faster than breeding: trait development in 1-2 years
Resurrect Bio claims to develop new resistance traits in one to two years – dramatically shorter than the decade‑long process of screening wild relatives through conventional breeding.
The Series A funds will be used to increase both AI throughput and biological screening capacity by 10-100x, enabling the company to test thousands more pathogen–receptor combinations and multiply its trait pipeline.
“We’ve got more than 10 traits in our development pipeline and plan to triple that in 2 years,” Duggan said. “We’ll be announcing a couple of commercial partnerships soon and we’d expect a handful more in the next 18 months.”
A platform built for industry-wide access
Corteva’s investment does not lock Resurrect Bio’s technology into any one germplasm. Instead, seed companies will license “blueprints” for gene edits that re‑activate resistance genes in their own breeding lines.
Resurrect Bio typically develops traits independently and licenses them out, but it also offers joint development agreements for companies wanting to co‑fund discovery from day one. Either route leads to commercial licensing, after which the seed company integrates the trait, breeds new varieties, conducts field trials and markets the seed.
With its expanded platform and funding, Duggan believes Resurrect Bio can transform the landscape of crop protection: “In two years, we plan to make more gene‑editable disease resistance traits than exist today.”
