AI transcript
0:00:02 (upbeat music)
0:00:07 Pushkin.
0:00:14 Let’s talk about fertilizer.
0:00:17 If fertilizer disappeared from the world tomorrow,
0:00:19 we wouldn’t be able to grow enough food
0:00:21 and billions of people would die.
0:00:25 The key ingredient in fertilizer is nitrogen.
0:00:28 It’s the most abundant element in the atmosphere.
0:00:30 It’s in every breath we breathe,
0:00:32 but plants can’t get it straight from the air.
0:00:34 In the early 20th century,
0:00:37 people figured out how to get nitrogen out of the air
0:00:41 and into ammonia, a solid form that plants can use.
0:00:43 It’s called the Haber-Bosch process.
0:00:44 It was an amazing breakthrough,
0:00:47 one of the key innovations of the 20th century.
0:00:50 But getting that nitrogen out of the air
0:00:54 and into solid fertilizer is wildly energy intensive,
0:00:56 a big contributor to climate change.
0:00:59 The process is also inefficient on the backend.
0:01:02 Farmers wind up putting tons of nitrogen-rich fertilizer
0:01:06 on their soil that winds up just getting washed away.
0:01:09 In other words, it’s been about a hundred years
0:01:11 since the last big breakthrough in fertilizer,
0:01:13 and we could really use another one.
0:01:16 (upbeat music)
0:01:22 I’m Jacob Goldstein, and this is What’s Your Problem,
0:01:23 the show where I talk to people
0:01:26 who are trying to make technological progress.
0:01:28 My guest today is Karsten Temme.
0:01:30 He’s a bio engineer and the co-founder
0:01:34 and chief innovation officer of Pivot Bio.
0:01:36 Karsten’s problem is this.
0:01:39 Can you use modern genetic tools
0:01:43 in order to get microbes that live in the soil
0:01:45 to grab more nitrogen for crops?
0:01:51 So how, how did you get into nitrogen?
0:01:57 Well, I worked on this problem
0:02:01 as the core focus of my PhD research in graduate school.
0:02:05 I got attracted to the West Coast
0:02:07 to study a field that was brand new.
0:02:09 It was called synthetic biology.
0:02:12 And the premise was that we now know enough
0:02:16 from sequencing genomes and from being able to apply
0:02:21 all of the modern discoveries of the technology discovered
0:02:27 by Silicon Valley to think about microbes in their DNA
0:02:29 as a new type of programming language.
0:02:32 We could reprogram microbes to do really useful things
0:02:36 for humanity, maybe make better medications
0:02:40 or to be able to help make more sustainable
0:02:41 building materials.
0:02:44 And for me, one of the biggest challenges was
0:02:46 right here at the crux of agriculture.
0:02:49 How do we make better performing fertilizer?
0:02:53 And synthetic biology offered a brand new set of tools
0:02:56 that we might be able to go tackle that problem.
0:02:59 So is it right that your first notion is to
0:03:02 essentially engineer plants
0:03:07 so that they can grab nitrogen directly out of the air?
0:03:11 Sort of a cut out the middleman strategy?
0:03:15 It’s been maybe an aspiration
0:03:20 of academia of science for the last 50 or 60 years.
0:03:24 Really, since the first tools,
0:03:27 the enzymes of genetic engineering were discovered,
0:03:30 it was one of the two or three examples cited
0:03:34 as a real big holy grail for the field.
0:03:35 ‘Cause you could just solve the problem,
0:03:37 you wouldn’t need fertilizer anymore.
0:03:40 Exactly, literally the nitrogen is right there
0:03:42 in the air all around the plant.
0:03:45 If only it could grab it somehow.
0:03:49 Exactly, let’s just put the DNA for that enzyme
0:03:51 into the plant and the plant can make its own enzyme,
0:03:53 it can make its own fertilizer.
0:03:54 Voila, we’ll have solved everything.
0:03:56 Very appealing.
0:03:59 So tell me about your efforts toward that end.
0:04:03 Well, across these 70 years,
0:04:08 since the first examples of DNA
0:04:09 were discovered, the first enzymes
0:04:12 from genetic engineering, collectively scientists
0:04:17 have reverse engineered how a microbe in its DNA,
0:04:22 that program for making the nitrogen producing enzyme
0:04:23 is encoded.
0:04:26 So they reverse engineered the whole blueprint
0:04:27 of that program.
0:04:29 I just happened to be in graduate school
0:04:31 when we had the chance to complete
0:04:33 the final last piece of that puzzle.
0:04:37 And so we showed you could package up all of the genes,
0:04:39 all of the DNA in a way that could make it
0:04:41 transferable to a plant.
0:04:45 The challenge was that we realized
0:04:48 it wasn’t the best, most efficient way
0:04:51 to actually build a product that could change agriculture.
0:04:56 It was a great example of scientific discovery.
0:05:00 It was a great example of how to understand
0:05:02 the beauty of nature around us.
0:05:04 And there was actually an easier way
0:05:07 rather than putting the whole program into a plant,
0:05:10 we could just get microbes to do more
0:05:12 of what they’re naturally capable of doing.
0:05:14 – Was there a moment when you realized
0:05:16 that going straight to the plant
0:05:18 wasn’t gonna be the best way to do it?
0:05:23 – I definitely remember one day,
0:05:25 early in the days of pivot,
0:05:28 where my co-founder and I had been working on
0:05:30 some research for a grant.
0:05:32 It had been our initial funding for the company
0:05:35 that came from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
0:05:36 Just a very tiny amount of money
0:05:38 for us to explore the possibility
0:05:42 of this blueprint from graduate school
0:05:43 and turning that into a crop
0:05:45 that could fix its own nitrogen.
0:05:47 And we were having this challenge,
0:05:50 we said even if you could take the best of those new tools
0:05:53 from CRISPR and apply them to this challenge,
0:05:55 it’s gonna be so many years
0:05:58 before we can build a crop that can fix its own nitrogen.
0:06:00 And how do we make this go faster?
0:06:04 Because the farmers around the world need a solution faster.
0:06:06 So we were walking to the coffee shop
0:06:08 and we just stopped in the middle
0:06:12 of the kind of grassy open space
0:06:14 between our lab and the coffee shop.
0:06:18 And we said, let’s get back to the thing that inspired us,
0:06:22 most the microbes that have this capability already.
0:06:23 And maybe we can figure out
0:06:26 what stops them from being the solution
0:06:28 and just attack that as the problem.
0:06:31 Let’s enable these microbes
0:06:32 just to do what they’re already able to do,
0:06:34 but do it better.
0:06:36 – So let’s talk about the microbes for a minute,
0:06:39 just how they work in a state of nature.
0:06:43 Just tell me about these microbes.
0:06:46 Like in a world, pre-fertilizer, non-fertilizer,
0:06:47 like what’s going on?
0:06:49 Where are they, what are they doing?
0:06:53 – Yeah, so just like you or I have a microbiome
0:06:56 and we hear about it related to digestive health a lot
0:06:58 and we can take probiotics.
0:07:02 A plant has a microbiome in its root system as well.
0:07:05 And the plant is part of photosynthesis
0:07:08 is taking some of that sugar that it produces
0:07:09 and it actually exudes it out of the roots
0:07:12 to feed the microbes in the soil.
0:07:13 And in exchange, the microbes
0:07:14 are supposed to be doing useful things
0:07:19 like making nitrogen or producing antifungal compounds
0:07:23 or helping go acquire some of the other nutrients
0:07:25 that are typically found in the rock,
0:07:27 but the microbes can help make some acids
0:07:28 that degrade those.
0:07:29 – Amazing.
0:07:31 – So they’re an extension of the plant
0:07:33 and its ability to survive
0:07:36 all the different types of challenges and stresses
0:07:38 it faces while it’s growing.
0:07:40 – And this particular microbe,
0:07:42 or it’s probably more than one,
0:07:45 but whatever this particular microbe or set of microbes
0:07:49 that are, you say, fixing nitrogen for the plants,
0:07:53 like what are they, what’s their deal?
0:07:54 What do they want out of life?
0:07:56 – That’s the most important thing
0:07:59 that the microbiome of the crop is responsible for
0:08:01 is fixing nitrogen.
0:08:04 So turning nitrogen gas into ammonia
0:08:07 and in exchange for sugar from the plant,
0:08:09 their food source, they’re doing something in return.
0:08:11 So it’s a nice symbiosis that exists
0:08:13 between the plant and the microbes.
0:08:16 And when we fertilize the soil,
0:08:18 those microbes aren’t shielded from all that nitrogen
0:08:19 that enters the soil.
0:08:22 And they sense the nitrogen in the soil
0:08:24 and they conserve their energy.
0:08:27 They stop making the enzymes that fix nitrogen.
0:08:29 They don’t give the plant any ammonia
0:08:31 and they just consume the sugars
0:08:33 that the plant exudes for free.
0:08:35 – Because they have some, whatever,
0:08:37 some sense of equilibrium that says,
0:08:40 oh, there’s enough nitrogen in the soil.
0:08:42 I’m gonna stop doing that now.
0:08:43 – That’s right, that’s right.
0:08:45 – And in sort of a state of nature,
0:08:47 that’s fine because whatever,
0:08:50 corn doesn’t need to grow seven feet tall in a month
0:08:51 or whatever it does in Iowa now.
0:08:53 And it’s fine and it’s no problem.
0:08:54 But in the world we live in,
0:08:58 that’s the fundamental problem is those microbes
0:09:01 don’t fix enough nitrogen to grow the supersize crops
0:09:03 we need to grow now.
0:09:04 – That’s right.
0:09:05 So crops go through growth spurts
0:09:07 just like we do when we’re growing up.
0:09:11 And as the crop enters the kind of the middle part
0:09:14 of its life cycle, it needs to grow very rapidly
0:09:17 before it starts making the grain.
0:09:19 And that’s where the disconnect comes from.
0:09:23 The mineralization rate, the rate of just background
0:09:25 nitrogen availability from the soil
0:09:27 can’t keep up with that growth spurt.
0:09:29 That’s why we need fertilizer today
0:09:33 because we’ve bred crops to be just so productive.
0:09:35 – So, okay, so you have this idea.
0:09:38 It’s an elegant idea, it’s an exciting idea.
0:09:43 Do you choose, like as you’re trying to make it work,
0:09:45 like do you choose a particular microbe
0:09:47 and say this is the one we’re going with?
0:09:50 Like what is the process of actually making it work?
0:09:54 – Well, so we started Pivot in the fall of 2011.
0:09:56 We started the company and some of the first things we did
0:10:00 is we wrote letters to different farmers
0:10:03 around the Midwest, friends and family.
0:10:04 Anybody who owned land and we said,
0:10:07 “Hey, send us just a bucket of soil.”
0:10:10 And we want to use that to discover microbes
0:10:12 that can change agriculture.
0:10:15 And so we’d pay everybody for a bucket of soil
0:10:18 and then we’d start growing little baby corn plants,
0:10:22 seedlings or wheat plants in that soil.
0:10:25 And the plants would act like a sponge.
0:10:27 They would attract the microbes
0:10:30 that are really important to be part of their microbiome.
0:10:32 And so when you take a seedling and you uproot it,
0:10:35 you can then take the dirt off of the roots,
0:10:39 kind of get the microbes that live on the roots of that crop.
0:10:43 And it becomes a great way to take the billions
0:10:45 of different microbes that are in the soil
0:10:48 and find just the ones that have a very close symbiosis
0:10:50 with the crop.
0:10:52 – And so what do you find when you do that?
0:10:56 – Well, there’s always a lot of great microbes.
0:10:58 Some do nitrogen fixation,
0:11:01 some do other types of functionality for the crop.
0:11:04 And so we had to look at the DNA of all of those microbes
0:11:07 and find the ones that have the program
0:11:10 for making this enzyme for nitrogen fixation.
0:11:11 And then we had to be able to figure out
0:11:14 how do you reverse engineer what that DNA says?
0:11:18 How does it control when that microbe operates the enzyme?
0:11:21 And from that process, it gave us the first microbes
0:11:24 that really could become workable for products.
0:11:28 – And do you end up arriving at one microbe,
0:11:32 at a suite of microbes, like where do you land?
0:11:35 – Well, we have dozens of different species of microbes.
0:11:37 They’re all kind of distantly related
0:11:40 that we work with today.
0:11:43 But in our products, our very first product that launched
0:11:48 in 2019, it had just one species of microbe.
0:11:51 And it’s actually something that in our second version
0:11:53 of the product, it’s become two microbes.
0:11:55 So two different species that work together.
0:11:57 They eat different sugars provided by the plant
0:12:00 and they live in a little bit different parts
0:12:00 of the root system.
0:12:02 So they work together as a team
0:12:04 to produce even more nitrogen for the crop.
0:12:06 – And that first one, is it for corn?
0:12:07 Is that right?
0:12:11 – It’s part of our product for corn
0:12:15 and it’s also part of our second product that we launched
0:12:18 that works on wheat, on the label.
0:12:22 You can use it on sorghum, on millet and oats,
0:12:25 barley, sunflowers even.
0:12:27 So really something that associates
0:12:31 with a range of different cereal crops
0:12:33 and it has a little bit different relationship
0:12:35 with each of those crops.
0:12:38 – So okay, so you find these few microbes that seem like,
0:12:42 yeah, these are the ones, but you need to,
0:12:44 you need to change them, right?
0:12:46 The problem is that in their natural state,
0:12:49 they’re not making enough nitrogen.
0:12:53 How do you get them to act the way you want them to act?
0:12:56 – Well, so let’s dive in a little bit more
0:12:58 on that very first product.
0:13:03 So one of our earliest team members, Sarah Block,
0:13:08 she had some farmland in the family
0:13:09 that we got a pail of soil from.
0:13:14 One of the corn plants we grew had an amazing microbe
0:13:16 living in its root system.
0:13:20 It’s a species of microbe called klebsiella varicola.
0:13:24 So a distant cousin of the klebsiella pneumonii
0:13:27 that make us sick, except this one is not virulent.
0:13:30 It is a beneficial microbe for crops
0:13:34 and it has the capability to fix nitrogen.
0:13:37 The challenge though is the way it’s wired,
0:13:40 it has a nitrogen sensor that it makes
0:13:43 and it’s part of kind of the cell membrane,
0:13:48 the outer surrounding membrane around this microbe.
0:13:52 So that when that sensor senses any sort of nitrogen
0:13:55 in the environment, it stops the DNA
0:13:58 from producing the enzyme for nitrogen fixation.
0:14:01 And so the very first thing we said is how do we,
0:14:03 how do we get the microbe to unlearn this process?
0:14:07 How can we disrupt that wiring, the genetic wiring?
0:14:10 And how do we do it in a way that doesn’t require
0:14:12 building a transgenic organism
0:14:13 because we don’t want to release
0:14:16 any crazy GMOs into the environment.
0:14:20 And so we used the modern tools of gene editing
0:14:24 to make a very precise break in the DNA
0:14:28 so that that nitrogen sensor doesn’t stop the microbe
0:14:31 from producing the nitrogen fixing enzyme.
0:14:33 And so our approach at Pivot is really a concept
0:14:36 of saying we want to simply remodel
0:14:39 the wiring of the cell
0:14:43 so that it can still do the same exact things it did before.
0:14:45 It just might choose to do them
0:14:47 under a different set of conditions.
0:14:49 – Now you have a number of products,
0:14:51 like how does it work?
0:14:52 What are you selling?
0:14:54 Who’s buying it and how does it work?
0:14:57 – Well, so let’s talk about what it means to be
0:15:02 maybe a modern sophisticated corn farmer
0:15:05 across the US Midwest.
0:15:09 One of the challenges is there are a half a dozen
0:15:12 different types of fertilizer and timings
0:15:14 when you might apply fertilizer.
0:15:16 The first big one you face is,
0:15:20 should I apply fertilizer, specifically anhydrous ammonia
0:15:24 in the fall after I just got done harvesting my last crop?
0:15:26 It’s probably one of the cheapest forms of nitrogen
0:15:28 you could go buy,
0:15:32 but you’re also gonna expose it to all of the winter snow
0:15:33 and all the spring rains.
0:15:35 And so a lot of it is gonna be lost.
0:15:38 Maybe up to 80% of your investment is gonna wash away
0:15:42 before the crop ever gets planted.
0:15:42 So there’s uncertainty,
0:15:44 ’cause who knows whether it’s gonna be a wet year,
0:15:47 a dry year, a hot year, a cold year.
0:15:49 And that same challenge persists
0:15:52 every decision point a farmer makes.
0:15:55 And they’re also completely subject
0:16:00 to the crazy volatility of the commodity pricing markets.
0:16:04 So for anybody paying attention to commodity prices
0:16:05 across the last couple of years,
0:16:08 the Russian invasion of Ukraine
0:16:11 and all of the supply chain consternation
0:16:15 sent fertilizer prices to record levels.
0:16:19 So that ripple effect means the challenge of managing
0:16:22 one of the biggest expenses on a farm
0:16:24 is not just stressful,
0:16:26 but it also could be the thing that separates a farm
0:16:30 from being profitable or being underwater each year.
0:16:34 So that’s the challenge that we’re operating in.
0:16:38 And what we try to do at Pivot is design these microbes
0:16:42 so that it makes everything easier and it reduces risk.
0:16:44 And it means that what we’re delivering
0:16:46 is not just the best performing nitrogen,
0:16:49 the best way to get that nitrogen into the crop
0:16:51 when it needs it during its growth spurt,
0:16:54 but it also is the most resilient
0:16:58 when it comes to the return on investment for the farmer,
0:17:03 the imperviousness to the unpredictable weather,
0:17:06 and also then the best as a ripple effect
0:17:08 for the environment, for the soil health, the water,
0:17:13 no runoff and no greenhouse gas emissions.
0:17:15 – So in more specific terms,
0:17:21 like just more narrowly, what does it do?
0:17:24 Like what are you selling and what does it do?
0:17:27 – So we’ve made two forms of our product today.
0:17:31 One is a liquid and then the other is a dry powder.
0:17:35 The liquid can get added to tanks on the machinery
0:17:38 that plants the seeds for that crop.
0:17:42 And as the planter is going across a field,
0:17:45 a little squirt of microbes gets added on top of the seed
0:17:49 in that furrow before the soil gets closed back up.
0:17:51 And with the other product,
0:17:54 before the farmer even takes possession of the seed
0:17:57 that they’re going to plant,
0:17:59 our microbes, the little dried powder
0:18:02 can get added as a coating onto the seed.
0:18:04 So then when the seed gets planted,
0:18:06 our microbes are already present in the first roots
0:18:11 that form start forming that symbiosis with the microbes.
0:18:14 So in both cases, simplify what it means to use our product
0:18:17 and just kind of add it into an existing step
0:18:19 in what it means to manage a farm.
0:18:22 – I want to read you a line
0:18:27 from this University of Minnesota study of proven,
0:18:28 some version of your product.
0:18:32 It said, proven can have an impact on corn growth,
0:18:35 but may not reduce the rate of nitrogen required by corn
0:18:39 across all locations and benefits may be specific
0:18:42 to soil types and specific environmental conditions.
0:18:44 Is that consistent with what you found?
0:18:52 – What we found is the ability to improve
0:18:56 how we use fertilizer and to lean on products
0:18:59 that pivot makes the microbes that fix nitrogen
0:19:02 as the new foundation for a fertilizer strategy.
0:19:06 It really, there’s two big challenges that are important.
0:19:09 One is these are living microbes.
0:19:13 They require more TLC to be able to use effectively
0:19:17 than that big bulky tons of chemical fertilizer
0:19:19 that our farmers normally going to use.
0:19:22 So we need to make sure that when our customers
0:19:26 are using our products, we’re keeping those microbes alive
0:19:27 so that when they’re in the soil,
0:19:30 they’re growing in symbiosis with the crop.
0:19:33 – What does TLC mean in that context?
0:19:35 – Well, it’s something where we want to make sure
0:19:38 that when we’re delivering our microbes
0:19:41 from the time we ship them until they get in the soil,
0:19:42 the microbes aren’t freezing.
0:19:44 They’re not left out in the sun
0:19:46 to bake in a hundred plus degree weather.
0:19:49 – Just sending a living thing, right?
0:19:52 You’re not just sending a compound, yeah, interesting.
0:19:53 – And if it’s our liquid product,
0:19:56 when they get put into that tank on the planter,
0:20:00 we’re not mixing in some sort of a antimicrobial agent
0:20:02 into the tank as well.
0:20:04 – Which could totally happen in this context.
0:20:05 – Totally, totally.
0:20:08 And that’s to be expected in some respects
0:20:13 because this is a new technology that we’re introducing.
0:20:15 – So just execution, just lots of just like nuts
0:20:17 and bolts logistics execution stuff
0:20:19 that is presumably hard
0:20:23 and the environment is heterogeneous in a way that is hard.
0:20:24 – That’s right.
0:20:26 And then the second thing that’s important
0:20:31 is when we add fertilizer to a field,
0:20:34 there’s a point when additional nitrogen
0:20:36 doesn’t lead to more crop yield.
0:20:38 Something else becomes limiting,
0:20:41 whether it’s the sunlight or a different nutrient
0:20:45 or maybe the total rainfall that that crop receives.
0:20:48 And so there’s a point where you get diminishing returns
0:20:52 on the amount of fertilizer you can add.
0:20:54 Now the challenge is always trying to figure out
0:20:55 what that best balance is.
0:20:58 And that perfect point changes every year
0:21:01 because of how much fertilizer gets washed away by the rain
0:21:03 since the amount of rain is different every year.
0:21:07 And so the biggest challenge we have is trying to figure out
0:21:12 how do you get a farmer to get the best possible experience
0:21:14 when they’re first using our product
0:21:16 to really build up the confidence
0:21:19 in getting to a better outcome each year
0:21:22 when the most variable thing in that whole equation
0:21:23 is fertilizer.
0:21:26 – You really want it to work the first time.
0:21:27 Like that’s a big one for you, right?
0:21:30 The first year you really want it to be great, yeah.
0:21:34 – And so there’s a lot of things that can separate
0:21:38 the perfect amount of nitrogen in the crop
0:21:40 from turning into a perfect amount of yield,
0:21:44 whether it’s pest pressure or droughts
0:21:48 or other types of nutrient limitations.
0:21:51 And so everything we try to do is to set that farmer up
0:21:54 to see the healthiest possible crop
0:21:57 and put them in the best position to realize
0:22:00 the potential yield of what that crop can produce
0:22:03 and do it in a way that really can overcome
0:22:06 the unpredictability of the fertilizer involved.
0:22:08 – So how big is Pivot?
0:22:11 Like how many acres of farmland
0:22:15 have your microbes in them this year?
0:22:19 – Well, so Pivot has been around for a bit more
0:22:22 than a decade and our products have been in the marketplace
0:22:25 for just about five years.
0:22:27 We’ve been able to deliver nitrogen
0:22:31 on more than 10 million acres across that time.
0:22:36 So millions of acres of products being used
0:22:38 just this year alone.
0:22:41 And we’re in a spot that our products are used
0:22:44 on corn crops across the US,
0:22:47 on wheat and sorghum, sunflower, barley,
0:22:48 some other small grains.
0:22:51 And we’re in the process of being able to establish
0:22:55 an international presence in places like Brazil
0:22:57 with an eye towards Canada as well.
0:22:58 – Is it right?
0:23:00 I mean, the idea at this point is not
0:23:04 to replace fertilizer, but to supplement it?
0:23:08 – Today our microbes are supplying about a quarter
0:23:10 of the nitrogen that the corn crop needs.
0:23:12 – Okay.
0:23:14 – And it’s something where we have the ability
0:23:16 to keep improving our microbes,
0:23:19 improve their ability to make that enzyme
0:23:21 and share the ammonia back with the crop
0:23:24 and improve their ability to match up perfectly
0:23:27 with that life cycle, the growth spurts in the plant.
0:23:32 So we’ll see that our products can become even a bigger portion
0:23:35 of the total nutrient supply the crop needs
0:23:38 and allow farmers to really start focusing on
0:23:41 what’s the next big challenge that prevents them
0:23:44 from reaching the full potential yield
0:23:46 that’s baked into the crop genetics.
0:23:52 – After the break, the best and worst things
0:23:55 about trying to sell a new product to farmers.
0:23:57 (upbeat music)
0:24:07 – What are you trying to figure out next?
0:24:10 Like what’s the lab side of your business look like now?
0:24:15 – We’ve been breeding crops for many, many years
0:24:19 for decades, for centuries, and especially
0:24:21 over the last century with an intensity
0:24:25 and a set of technologies that have been unprecedented
0:24:26 in our history.
0:24:29 And we’ve underappreciated and not even known
0:24:33 about the microbes in the roots of a plant
0:24:35 until just recently.
0:24:39 So our ability to tap into getting microbes
0:24:41 to capture as much of that sugar
0:24:43 that the crop can provide,
0:24:46 being able to efficiently grow in tandem
0:24:48 with the roots of the plant,
0:24:51 being able to share ammonia back with the crop
0:24:54 and do that in a way that is really tuned
0:24:58 with the metabolism of how a crop produces grain and yield.
0:25:03 There’s a lot of opportunity to not just discover new science
0:25:06 but turn that into products that really can supply
0:25:09 all the nutrient needs of the crop and beyond.
0:25:11 I think we are very much in the early days
0:25:15 of what can be a transformational technology
0:25:19 and segment of the industry for decades to come.
0:25:21 – What’s an interesting constraint you’re trying to solve
0:25:23 for at a technical level?
0:25:26 I mean, if you have a new idea for an app in Silicon Valley,
0:25:30 you can program it and launch it or test it out
0:25:32 as fast as the pace of thought.
0:25:36 And in agriculture, everything we do
0:25:39 is centered on how fast a plant grows.
0:25:40 There are many parts of the world
0:25:42 where you can grow just one crop every year.
0:25:45 And so if we had a new idea and we wanted to test it out,
0:25:48 it might be just one experiment per year that we’ll do.
0:25:50 – So your rate limiting step
0:25:52 is that you gotta wait for the plants to grow.
0:25:53 Now, one of the things we’ve done at Pivot
0:25:57 is we have built the most sophisticated models
0:26:02 of how a micro behaves and how what we do
0:26:06 with the gene editing rewires when it chooses
0:26:07 to make nitrogen.
0:26:09 And we can integrate that with all the world’s best models
0:26:14 of how crops grow and a footprint that allows us to do
0:26:20 real world experiments at a scale never before seen.
0:26:22 Those things let us be able to tackle problems
0:26:27 in a more efficient way or experiment digitally
0:26:29 long before you ever do something in the physical.
0:26:31 – But you still gotta grow the corn
0:26:32 and see if it really works.
0:26:34 – But you still gotta grow all those crops.
0:26:38 – I mean, well, let’s talk about sort of the future
0:26:41 of chemical fertilizer in particular ammonia, right?
0:26:45 Super energy intensive would be wonderful
0:26:47 if you could put it out of business.
0:26:50 But what’s that story?
0:26:52 – Well, I don’t think that the fertilizer business
0:26:54 and the Haber-Bosch process of making ammonia
0:26:56 will go away anytime soon.
0:26:58 And that’s not a bad thing.
0:27:03 It’s not a thing where I think we are successful
0:27:06 only if the fertilizer industry goes bankrupt.
0:27:09 I think this is something where this is an opportunity
0:27:12 to be able to do better and reach new places
0:27:16 through a very innovative disruptive technology.
0:27:20 We’re a better way to spend new capital.
0:27:25 Our ability to expand our footprint, our supply chain,
0:27:28 is radically cheaper than building a new Haber-Bosch facility
0:27:30 that’s gonna cost billions of dollars
0:27:33 and take a decade to get operational.
0:27:36 We’re really just like a microbreem
0:27:40 making a handful of bakers yeast.
0:27:43 And that is transformational.
0:27:48 It means there’s a lot more efficiency
0:27:52 both in dollars and just physical time invested
0:27:56 to be able to complement what the fertilizer industry
0:27:57 is set up to be able to do.
0:28:00 – I know that the context we’re talking about,
0:28:03 there’s a ton going on and there’s chemical fertilizer
0:28:05 and there’s pesticide and the plants themselves
0:28:08 are these weird super plants that we’ve bred.
0:28:11 And yet still I wonder when you’re changing
0:28:16 the genome of this microbe, like, is there any worry
0:28:20 that you’re gonna mess up the microbiome
0:28:23 in some unintended consequences kind of way?
0:28:28 – There’s a lot we do to make sure that we understand
0:28:31 how our products work, that they are fitting
0:28:36 into the crop system in a very smooth, elegant way
0:28:41 that they go back into the native microbiomes
0:28:46 where they came from and they’re performing just like before.
0:28:49 One of the things we know is that when we do the gene editing
0:28:51 to turn on nitrogen fixational,
0:28:55 it makes the microbes less resilient, less robust
0:28:57 than their original parents.
0:29:01 That means that they die off more quickly
0:29:03 than the native microbes do.
0:29:05 So when we do testing, we don’t see any traces
0:29:08 of our microbes left in the roots
0:29:10 once the crop really gets to the point of harvest.
0:29:15 Just natively, the crop, when it’s harvested,
0:29:16 it stops making those sugars.
0:29:19 So the microbes in the soil die off
0:29:23 when there isn’t a parent crop to defeat it.
0:29:26 But we especially see that with our products.
0:29:29 – So you’re still a small company.
0:29:32 What might go wrong?
0:29:35 Like, what are some reasons, you know,
0:29:37 things might not work out the way you hope?
0:29:42 – I think the mode we’re in right now with Pivot is,
0:29:45 we have this great disruptive technology.
0:29:49 We have built a business model that is innovative
0:29:52 and allows us to get our products into the marketplace
0:29:54 when it’s typically been very hard
0:29:55 to innovate in agriculture.
0:29:58 And now we have the challenge of how do we bring that to scale
0:30:01 and how do we touch as many lives around the world
0:30:06 as we can, all while we’re trying to manage our cash reserves
0:30:09 and what it means to have a growing team
0:30:10 that needs to figure out how to work
0:30:13 in more places around the world.
0:30:16 That’s a lot of operational risk.
0:30:20 And I think the challenge that we face is,
0:30:23 there’s a chance that all might not work out.
0:30:28 I think that the real risk is that we’re not able
0:30:31 to move fast enough to be the leading innovator in the space,
0:30:33 that there becomes competition that slows us down
0:30:35 and trips us up.
0:30:38 – So in that universe, somebody’s gonna do what you’re doing.
0:30:39 The question is, is it gonna be you
0:30:41 or is somebody gonna be you?
0:30:45 – 100%, like what we’ve been successful
0:30:50 is really showing the potential of where microbes in general
0:30:55 and nitrogen fixation specifically can change agriculture.
0:30:56 It will happen.
0:30:59 We will see a transformational shift
0:31:04 in how our agricultural systems around the world operate.
0:31:06 And I think the operational risk for pivot
0:31:09 is all about whether we are gonna be the ones
0:31:13 who lead the way in bringing the change to the world.
0:31:17 – So if you think about the work you’re doing
0:31:20 and project ahead, often I’ll say five years,
0:31:21 but given as you pointed out
0:31:23 that you gotta wait for the corn to grow every year,
0:31:25 let’s say 20 years.
0:31:26 If you think I had 20 years
0:31:30 and things happen the way you want them to happen,
0:31:31 what’s the world look like?
0:31:38 – I’ll hit on three things that I think
0:31:40 are gonna be important to pay attention to,
0:31:44 either because it’s places we’re investing internally
0:31:47 to improve what we do, how we bring that,
0:31:49 a spotlight to these topics,
0:31:52 or the potential of where this could ripple.
0:31:56 One of them is, I think we’re gonna see
0:32:00 a continued trend of improving agricultural productivity
0:32:03 with better efficiency and especially better resiliency.
0:32:07 And when it becomes even more challenging every day
0:32:09 to be a farmer and turn a profit every year,
0:32:12 I think that we’re gonna have a big impact
0:32:16 on the continuity of our agricultural system.
0:32:17 So that’s the first one.
0:32:19 And the second one for me is,
0:32:23 we’re seeing a massive potential impact
0:32:26 on the entire sustainability of agriculture.
0:32:28 So just in the last two years,
0:32:33 we’ve seen that replacement of fertilizer by our customers
0:32:37 has translated to nearly a million metric tons
0:32:39 of avoided CO2 emissions,
0:32:43 either the CO2 from the Harbor Wash manufacturing process
0:32:45 and the transportation of fertilizer
0:32:49 or the prevented nitrous oxide emissions
0:32:51 from fertilizer degrading in fields.
0:32:53 And we’re just getting started.
0:32:54 So that sustainability impact,
0:32:57 whether it’s clean air or clean water
0:33:00 or healthier soils is going to have the potential
0:33:04 to really multiply across the decades to come.
0:33:09 And then I think the third is about really food security,
0:33:15 whether it is the ability of more industrialized,
0:33:20 agricultural regions like the Midwest and the US
0:33:25 being even more capable of producing at higher efficiency,
0:33:27 independent of some of the uncertainties
0:33:29 of global supply chains,
0:33:31 or places like Sub-Saharan Africa,
0:33:35 where there are very uncertain supply chains for fertilizer.
0:33:37 The chance is that a farmer there
0:33:40 may not even be able to acquire fertilizer.
0:33:43 And if they can acquire it,
0:33:44 usually on a price point,
0:33:47 that far exceeds the value of using fertilizer.
0:33:52 So it’s an ability to take many parts of the world
0:33:53 and have access to the nutrients
0:33:55 that are needed to fuel a crop
0:34:00 in a way that can decouple many of the limitations
0:34:02 of the traditional supply chains.
0:34:04 So I think those are the three big areas
0:34:07 that I see some really exciting opportunity
0:34:08 in the decades ahead.
0:34:11 (upbeat music)
0:34:15 – We’ll be back in a minute with the lightning round.
0:34:17 (upbeat music)
0:34:28 – Um, almost done.
0:34:31 We’ll just do a lightning round and then we’ll be done.
0:34:33 Do you have a garden?
0:34:35 – I do.
0:34:38 – What did best for you this year?
0:34:40 What was your, what was the hit of the garden?
0:34:42 – Well, I, my kids,
0:34:43 I’ve got a seven-year-old and a 10-year-old
0:34:45 and we love gardening together.
0:34:48 I think pumpkins are always fun.
0:34:51 I, we grow a lot of flowers
0:34:53 that my daughter loves to grow.
0:34:56 So zinnias and dahlias are the ones
0:34:58 that are high on her list.
0:35:03 – What’s your second favorite element?
0:35:08 – Well, I will go with oxygen.
0:35:12 I think it, it is both such a fuel
0:35:14 for keeping us alive.
0:35:18 But I also, I love wine and everything
0:35:21 from viniculture and inology
0:35:23 and oxygen is usually the enemy of wine.
0:35:26 So oxygen is, is both powerful
0:35:30 and, and also something that can really be a challenge
0:35:31 for not just wine,
0:35:34 but the enzyme of nitrogen fixation itself.
0:35:37 – What was the last time you played the trumpet?
0:35:42 – Oh man, that’s a good question.
0:35:43 It’s, it’s been a while.
0:35:44 It’s probably been a decade.
0:35:47 – There was another version where you were like,
0:35:48 it’s right here.
0:35:49 That was my dream.
0:35:57 What’s the best thing about working with farmers?
0:36:02 – In a world where so much seems more virtual
0:36:03 or digital all the time,
0:36:06 being able to get back to something physical,
0:36:11 something that, that just requires a lot of hard work
0:36:14 in person.
0:36:18 That makes for some really invigorating conversations
0:36:21 and just a lot of times that a shared appreciation
0:36:22 at the end of a day,
0:36:25 a end of a hard work to sit down together
0:36:27 and, and spend time together.
0:36:30 – What’s a hard thing about working with farmers?
0:36:35 – Well, on one hand, a farmer needs to be risk averse.
0:36:38 So any new technology, any new innovation,
0:36:39 it’s not like you can just download a new app,
0:36:40 try it out and delete it.
0:36:43 – Right, it’s a huge downside if it’s not good.
0:36:45 – You might go out of business and lose that family farm
0:36:46 that’s been around for generations
0:36:48 if you make the wrong bet.
0:36:51 So the hardest part about trying to bring new technology
0:36:54 on the farm is figuring out the risk portion
0:36:56 of trying something out.
0:36:57 So farmers want to experiment,
0:37:01 but just do it in a way that is risk averse.
0:37:04 And then the challenge with a lot of us
0:37:07 that don’t live on a farm is we don’t appreciate
0:37:10 just how sophisticated that farm is
0:37:12 and how sophisticated that ability
0:37:14 to experiment without risk
0:37:16 or without unnecessary risk really is.
0:37:19 And so how do we talk to each other in a way
0:37:21 that moves ideas as fast as possible,
0:37:25 especially when we only grow one crop a year?
0:37:27 Like that is the hardest part about this whole thing,
0:37:29 bringing innovation into the world
0:37:32 is there’s a fundamental slow pace,
0:37:37 a need to be able to minimize risk to the negative
0:37:40 and a real opportunity to work with
0:37:44 some of the most innovative, forward-thinking entrepreneurs
0:37:47 and business owners that exist in this world.
0:37:49 If only we can figure out how to all communicate
0:37:52 in something that isn’t common terminology
0:37:55 and familiar for most of us.
0:37:58 – Thank you, it was great to talk with you.
0:37:59 – Thank you as well.
0:38:02 (upbeat music)
0:38:04 – Karsten Temi is the co-founder
0:38:07 and chief information officer at PivotBio.
0:38:11 Today’s show was produced by Gabriel Hunter Chang.
0:38:13 It was edited by Lydia Jean Cotte
0:38:16 and engineered by Sarah Brugier.
0:38:20 You can email us at problem@pushkin.fm.
0:38:22 I’m Jacob Goldstein and we’ll be back next week
0:38:24 with another episode of What’s Your Problem?
0:38:27 (upbeat music)
0:38:29 (upbeat music)
0:38:32 (upbeat music)
0:38:42 [BLANK_AUDIO]
0:00:07 Pushkin.
0:00:14 Let’s talk about fertilizer.
0:00:17 If fertilizer disappeared from the world tomorrow,
0:00:19 we wouldn’t be able to grow enough food
0:00:21 and billions of people would die.
0:00:25 The key ingredient in fertilizer is nitrogen.
0:00:28 It’s the most abundant element in the atmosphere.
0:00:30 It’s in every breath we breathe,
0:00:32 but plants can’t get it straight from the air.
0:00:34 In the early 20th century,
0:00:37 people figured out how to get nitrogen out of the air
0:00:41 and into ammonia, a solid form that plants can use.
0:00:43 It’s called the Haber-Bosch process.
0:00:44 It was an amazing breakthrough,
0:00:47 one of the key innovations of the 20th century.
0:00:50 But getting that nitrogen out of the air
0:00:54 and into solid fertilizer is wildly energy intensive,
0:00:56 a big contributor to climate change.
0:00:59 The process is also inefficient on the backend.
0:01:02 Farmers wind up putting tons of nitrogen-rich fertilizer
0:01:06 on their soil that winds up just getting washed away.
0:01:09 In other words, it’s been about a hundred years
0:01:11 since the last big breakthrough in fertilizer,
0:01:13 and we could really use another one.
0:01:16 (upbeat music)
0:01:22 I’m Jacob Goldstein, and this is What’s Your Problem,
0:01:23 the show where I talk to people
0:01:26 who are trying to make technological progress.
0:01:28 My guest today is Karsten Temme.
0:01:30 He’s a bio engineer and the co-founder
0:01:34 and chief innovation officer of Pivot Bio.
0:01:36 Karsten’s problem is this.
0:01:39 Can you use modern genetic tools
0:01:43 in order to get microbes that live in the soil
0:01:45 to grab more nitrogen for crops?
0:01:51 So how, how did you get into nitrogen?
0:01:57 Well, I worked on this problem
0:02:01 as the core focus of my PhD research in graduate school.
0:02:05 I got attracted to the West Coast
0:02:07 to study a field that was brand new.
0:02:09 It was called synthetic biology.
0:02:12 And the premise was that we now know enough
0:02:16 from sequencing genomes and from being able to apply
0:02:21 all of the modern discoveries of the technology discovered
0:02:27 by Silicon Valley to think about microbes in their DNA
0:02:29 as a new type of programming language.
0:02:32 We could reprogram microbes to do really useful things
0:02:36 for humanity, maybe make better medications
0:02:40 or to be able to help make more sustainable
0:02:41 building materials.
0:02:44 And for me, one of the biggest challenges was
0:02:46 right here at the crux of agriculture.
0:02:49 How do we make better performing fertilizer?
0:02:53 And synthetic biology offered a brand new set of tools
0:02:56 that we might be able to go tackle that problem.
0:02:59 So is it right that your first notion is to
0:03:02 essentially engineer plants
0:03:07 so that they can grab nitrogen directly out of the air?
0:03:11 Sort of a cut out the middleman strategy?
0:03:15 It’s been maybe an aspiration
0:03:20 of academia of science for the last 50 or 60 years.
0:03:24 Really, since the first tools,
0:03:27 the enzymes of genetic engineering were discovered,
0:03:30 it was one of the two or three examples cited
0:03:34 as a real big holy grail for the field.
0:03:35 ‘Cause you could just solve the problem,
0:03:37 you wouldn’t need fertilizer anymore.
0:03:40 Exactly, literally the nitrogen is right there
0:03:42 in the air all around the plant.
0:03:45 If only it could grab it somehow.
0:03:49 Exactly, let’s just put the DNA for that enzyme
0:03:51 into the plant and the plant can make its own enzyme,
0:03:53 it can make its own fertilizer.
0:03:54 Voila, we’ll have solved everything.
0:03:56 Very appealing.
0:03:59 So tell me about your efforts toward that end.
0:04:03 Well, across these 70 years,
0:04:08 since the first examples of DNA
0:04:09 were discovered, the first enzymes
0:04:12 from genetic engineering, collectively scientists
0:04:17 have reverse engineered how a microbe in its DNA,
0:04:22 that program for making the nitrogen producing enzyme
0:04:23 is encoded.
0:04:26 So they reverse engineered the whole blueprint
0:04:27 of that program.
0:04:29 I just happened to be in graduate school
0:04:31 when we had the chance to complete
0:04:33 the final last piece of that puzzle.
0:04:37 And so we showed you could package up all of the genes,
0:04:39 all of the DNA in a way that could make it
0:04:41 transferable to a plant.
0:04:45 The challenge was that we realized
0:04:48 it wasn’t the best, most efficient way
0:04:51 to actually build a product that could change agriculture.
0:04:56 It was a great example of scientific discovery.
0:05:00 It was a great example of how to understand
0:05:02 the beauty of nature around us.
0:05:04 And there was actually an easier way
0:05:07 rather than putting the whole program into a plant,
0:05:10 we could just get microbes to do more
0:05:12 of what they’re naturally capable of doing.
0:05:14 – Was there a moment when you realized
0:05:16 that going straight to the plant
0:05:18 wasn’t gonna be the best way to do it?
0:05:23 – I definitely remember one day,
0:05:25 early in the days of pivot,
0:05:28 where my co-founder and I had been working on
0:05:30 some research for a grant.
0:05:32 It had been our initial funding for the company
0:05:35 that came from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
0:05:36 Just a very tiny amount of money
0:05:38 for us to explore the possibility
0:05:42 of this blueprint from graduate school
0:05:43 and turning that into a crop
0:05:45 that could fix its own nitrogen.
0:05:47 And we were having this challenge,
0:05:50 we said even if you could take the best of those new tools
0:05:53 from CRISPR and apply them to this challenge,
0:05:55 it’s gonna be so many years
0:05:58 before we can build a crop that can fix its own nitrogen.
0:06:00 And how do we make this go faster?
0:06:04 Because the farmers around the world need a solution faster.
0:06:06 So we were walking to the coffee shop
0:06:08 and we just stopped in the middle
0:06:12 of the kind of grassy open space
0:06:14 between our lab and the coffee shop.
0:06:18 And we said, let’s get back to the thing that inspired us,
0:06:22 most the microbes that have this capability already.
0:06:23 And maybe we can figure out
0:06:26 what stops them from being the solution
0:06:28 and just attack that as the problem.
0:06:31 Let’s enable these microbes
0:06:32 just to do what they’re already able to do,
0:06:34 but do it better.
0:06:36 – So let’s talk about the microbes for a minute,
0:06:39 just how they work in a state of nature.
0:06:43 Just tell me about these microbes.
0:06:46 Like in a world, pre-fertilizer, non-fertilizer,
0:06:47 like what’s going on?
0:06:49 Where are they, what are they doing?
0:06:53 – Yeah, so just like you or I have a microbiome
0:06:56 and we hear about it related to digestive health a lot
0:06:58 and we can take probiotics.
0:07:02 A plant has a microbiome in its root system as well.
0:07:05 And the plant is part of photosynthesis
0:07:08 is taking some of that sugar that it produces
0:07:09 and it actually exudes it out of the roots
0:07:12 to feed the microbes in the soil.
0:07:13 And in exchange, the microbes
0:07:14 are supposed to be doing useful things
0:07:19 like making nitrogen or producing antifungal compounds
0:07:23 or helping go acquire some of the other nutrients
0:07:25 that are typically found in the rock,
0:07:27 but the microbes can help make some acids
0:07:28 that degrade those.
0:07:29 – Amazing.
0:07:31 – So they’re an extension of the plant
0:07:33 and its ability to survive
0:07:36 all the different types of challenges and stresses
0:07:38 it faces while it’s growing.
0:07:40 – And this particular microbe,
0:07:42 or it’s probably more than one,
0:07:45 but whatever this particular microbe or set of microbes
0:07:49 that are, you say, fixing nitrogen for the plants,
0:07:53 like what are they, what’s their deal?
0:07:54 What do they want out of life?
0:07:56 – That’s the most important thing
0:07:59 that the microbiome of the crop is responsible for
0:08:01 is fixing nitrogen.
0:08:04 So turning nitrogen gas into ammonia
0:08:07 and in exchange for sugar from the plant,
0:08:09 their food source, they’re doing something in return.
0:08:11 So it’s a nice symbiosis that exists
0:08:13 between the plant and the microbes.
0:08:16 And when we fertilize the soil,
0:08:18 those microbes aren’t shielded from all that nitrogen
0:08:19 that enters the soil.
0:08:22 And they sense the nitrogen in the soil
0:08:24 and they conserve their energy.
0:08:27 They stop making the enzymes that fix nitrogen.
0:08:29 They don’t give the plant any ammonia
0:08:31 and they just consume the sugars
0:08:33 that the plant exudes for free.
0:08:35 – Because they have some, whatever,
0:08:37 some sense of equilibrium that says,
0:08:40 oh, there’s enough nitrogen in the soil.
0:08:42 I’m gonna stop doing that now.
0:08:43 – That’s right, that’s right.
0:08:45 – And in sort of a state of nature,
0:08:47 that’s fine because whatever,
0:08:50 corn doesn’t need to grow seven feet tall in a month
0:08:51 or whatever it does in Iowa now.
0:08:53 And it’s fine and it’s no problem.
0:08:54 But in the world we live in,
0:08:58 that’s the fundamental problem is those microbes
0:09:01 don’t fix enough nitrogen to grow the supersize crops
0:09:03 we need to grow now.
0:09:04 – That’s right.
0:09:05 So crops go through growth spurts
0:09:07 just like we do when we’re growing up.
0:09:11 And as the crop enters the kind of the middle part
0:09:14 of its life cycle, it needs to grow very rapidly
0:09:17 before it starts making the grain.
0:09:19 And that’s where the disconnect comes from.
0:09:23 The mineralization rate, the rate of just background
0:09:25 nitrogen availability from the soil
0:09:27 can’t keep up with that growth spurt.
0:09:29 That’s why we need fertilizer today
0:09:33 because we’ve bred crops to be just so productive.
0:09:35 – So, okay, so you have this idea.
0:09:38 It’s an elegant idea, it’s an exciting idea.
0:09:43 Do you choose, like as you’re trying to make it work,
0:09:45 like do you choose a particular microbe
0:09:47 and say this is the one we’re going with?
0:09:50 Like what is the process of actually making it work?
0:09:54 – Well, so we started Pivot in the fall of 2011.
0:09:56 We started the company and some of the first things we did
0:10:00 is we wrote letters to different farmers
0:10:03 around the Midwest, friends and family.
0:10:04 Anybody who owned land and we said,
0:10:07 “Hey, send us just a bucket of soil.”
0:10:10 And we want to use that to discover microbes
0:10:12 that can change agriculture.
0:10:15 And so we’d pay everybody for a bucket of soil
0:10:18 and then we’d start growing little baby corn plants,
0:10:22 seedlings or wheat plants in that soil.
0:10:25 And the plants would act like a sponge.
0:10:27 They would attract the microbes
0:10:30 that are really important to be part of their microbiome.
0:10:32 And so when you take a seedling and you uproot it,
0:10:35 you can then take the dirt off of the roots,
0:10:39 kind of get the microbes that live on the roots of that crop.
0:10:43 And it becomes a great way to take the billions
0:10:45 of different microbes that are in the soil
0:10:48 and find just the ones that have a very close symbiosis
0:10:50 with the crop.
0:10:52 – And so what do you find when you do that?
0:10:56 – Well, there’s always a lot of great microbes.
0:10:58 Some do nitrogen fixation,
0:11:01 some do other types of functionality for the crop.
0:11:04 And so we had to look at the DNA of all of those microbes
0:11:07 and find the ones that have the program
0:11:10 for making this enzyme for nitrogen fixation.
0:11:11 And then we had to be able to figure out
0:11:14 how do you reverse engineer what that DNA says?
0:11:18 How does it control when that microbe operates the enzyme?
0:11:21 And from that process, it gave us the first microbes
0:11:24 that really could become workable for products.
0:11:28 – And do you end up arriving at one microbe,
0:11:32 at a suite of microbes, like where do you land?
0:11:35 – Well, we have dozens of different species of microbes.
0:11:37 They’re all kind of distantly related
0:11:40 that we work with today.
0:11:43 But in our products, our very first product that launched
0:11:48 in 2019, it had just one species of microbe.
0:11:51 And it’s actually something that in our second version
0:11:53 of the product, it’s become two microbes.
0:11:55 So two different species that work together.
0:11:57 They eat different sugars provided by the plant
0:12:00 and they live in a little bit different parts
0:12:00 of the root system.
0:12:02 So they work together as a team
0:12:04 to produce even more nitrogen for the crop.
0:12:06 – And that first one, is it for corn?
0:12:07 Is that right?
0:12:11 – It’s part of our product for corn
0:12:15 and it’s also part of our second product that we launched
0:12:18 that works on wheat, on the label.
0:12:22 You can use it on sorghum, on millet and oats,
0:12:25 barley, sunflowers even.
0:12:27 So really something that associates
0:12:31 with a range of different cereal crops
0:12:33 and it has a little bit different relationship
0:12:35 with each of those crops.
0:12:38 – So okay, so you find these few microbes that seem like,
0:12:42 yeah, these are the ones, but you need to,
0:12:44 you need to change them, right?
0:12:46 The problem is that in their natural state,
0:12:49 they’re not making enough nitrogen.
0:12:53 How do you get them to act the way you want them to act?
0:12:56 – Well, so let’s dive in a little bit more
0:12:58 on that very first product.
0:13:03 So one of our earliest team members, Sarah Block,
0:13:08 she had some farmland in the family
0:13:09 that we got a pail of soil from.
0:13:14 One of the corn plants we grew had an amazing microbe
0:13:16 living in its root system.
0:13:20 It’s a species of microbe called klebsiella varicola.
0:13:24 So a distant cousin of the klebsiella pneumonii
0:13:27 that make us sick, except this one is not virulent.
0:13:30 It is a beneficial microbe for crops
0:13:34 and it has the capability to fix nitrogen.
0:13:37 The challenge though is the way it’s wired,
0:13:40 it has a nitrogen sensor that it makes
0:13:43 and it’s part of kind of the cell membrane,
0:13:48 the outer surrounding membrane around this microbe.
0:13:52 So that when that sensor senses any sort of nitrogen
0:13:55 in the environment, it stops the DNA
0:13:58 from producing the enzyme for nitrogen fixation.
0:14:01 And so the very first thing we said is how do we,
0:14:03 how do we get the microbe to unlearn this process?
0:14:07 How can we disrupt that wiring, the genetic wiring?
0:14:10 And how do we do it in a way that doesn’t require
0:14:12 building a transgenic organism
0:14:13 because we don’t want to release
0:14:16 any crazy GMOs into the environment.
0:14:20 And so we used the modern tools of gene editing
0:14:24 to make a very precise break in the DNA
0:14:28 so that that nitrogen sensor doesn’t stop the microbe
0:14:31 from producing the nitrogen fixing enzyme.
0:14:33 And so our approach at Pivot is really a concept
0:14:36 of saying we want to simply remodel
0:14:39 the wiring of the cell
0:14:43 so that it can still do the same exact things it did before.
0:14:45 It just might choose to do them
0:14:47 under a different set of conditions.
0:14:49 – Now you have a number of products,
0:14:51 like how does it work?
0:14:52 What are you selling?
0:14:54 Who’s buying it and how does it work?
0:14:57 – Well, so let’s talk about what it means to be
0:15:02 maybe a modern sophisticated corn farmer
0:15:05 across the US Midwest.
0:15:09 One of the challenges is there are a half a dozen
0:15:12 different types of fertilizer and timings
0:15:14 when you might apply fertilizer.
0:15:16 The first big one you face is,
0:15:20 should I apply fertilizer, specifically anhydrous ammonia
0:15:24 in the fall after I just got done harvesting my last crop?
0:15:26 It’s probably one of the cheapest forms of nitrogen
0:15:28 you could go buy,
0:15:32 but you’re also gonna expose it to all of the winter snow
0:15:33 and all the spring rains.
0:15:35 And so a lot of it is gonna be lost.
0:15:38 Maybe up to 80% of your investment is gonna wash away
0:15:42 before the crop ever gets planted.
0:15:42 So there’s uncertainty,
0:15:44 ’cause who knows whether it’s gonna be a wet year,
0:15:47 a dry year, a hot year, a cold year.
0:15:49 And that same challenge persists
0:15:52 every decision point a farmer makes.
0:15:55 And they’re also completely subject
0:16:00 to the crazy volatility of the commodity pricing markets.
0:16:04 So for anybody paying attention to commodity prices
0:16:05 across the last couple of years,
0:16:08 the Russian invasion of Ukraine
0:16:11 and all of the supply chain consternation
0:16:15 sent fertilizer prices to record levels.
0:16:19 So that ripple effect means the challenge of managing
0:16:22 one of the biggest expenses on a farm
0:16:24 is not just stressful,
0:16:26 but it also could be the thing that separates a farm
0:16:30 from being profitable or being underwater each year.
0:16:34 So that’s the challenge that we’re operating in.
0:16:38 And what we try to do at Pivot is design these microbes
0:16:42 so that it makes everything easier and it reduces risk.
0:16:44 And it means that what we’re delivering
0:16:46 is not just the best performing nitrogen,
0:16:49 the best way to get that nitrogen into the crop
0:16:51 when it needs it during its growth spurt,
0:16:54 but it also is the most resilient
0:16:58 when it comes to the return on investment for the farmer,
0:17:03 the imperviousness to the unpredictable weather,
0:17:06 and also then the best as a ripple effect
0:17:08 for the environment, for the soil health, the water,
0:17:13 no runoff and no greenhouse gas emissions.
0:17:15 – So in more specific terms,
0:17:21 like just more narrowly, what does it do?
0:17:24 Like what are you selling and what does it do?
0:17:27 – So we’ve made two forms of our product today.
0:17:31 One is a liquid and then the other is a dry powder.
0:17:35 The liquid can get added to tanks on the machinery
0:17:38 that plants the seeds for that crop.
0:17:42 And as the planter is going across a field,
0:17:45 a little squirt of microbes gets added on top of the seed
0:17:49 in that furrow before the soil gets closed back up.
0:17:51 And with the other product,
0:17:54 before the farmer even takes possession of the seed
0:17:57 that they’re going to plant,
0:17:59 our microbes, the little dried powder
0:18:02 can get added as a coating onto the seed.
0:18:04 So then when the seed gets planted,
0:18:06 our microbes are already present in the first roots
0:18:11 that form start forming that symbiosis with the microbes.
0:18:14 So in both cases, simplify what it means to use our product
0:18:17 and just kind of add it into an existing step
0:18:19 in what it means to manage a farm.
0:18:22 – I want to read you a line
0:18:27 from this University of Minnesota study of proven,
0:18:28 some version of your product.
0:18:32 It said, proven can have an impact on corn growth,
0:18:35 but may not reduce the rate of nitrogen required by corn
0:18:39 across all locations and benefits may be specific
0:18:42 to soil types and specific environmental conditions.
0:18:44 Is that consistent with what you found?
0:18:52 – What we found is the ability to improve
0:18:56 how we use fertilizer and to lean on products
0:18:59 that pivot makes the microbes that fix nitrogen
0:19:02 as the new foundation for a fertilizer strategy.
0:19:06 It really, there’s two big challenges that are important.
0:19:09 One is these are living microbes.
0:19:13 They require more TLC to be able to use effectively
0:19:17 than that big bulky tons of chemical fertilizer
0:19:19 that our farmers normally going to use.
0:19:22 So we need to make sure that when our customers
0:19:26 are using our products, we’re keeping those microbes alive
0:19:27 so that when they’re in the soil,
0:19:30 they’re growing in symbiosis with the crop.
0:19:33 – What does TLC mean in that context?
0:19:35 – Well, it’s something where we want to make sure
0:19:38 that when we’re delivering our microbes
0:19:41 from the time we ship them until they get in the soil,
0:19:42 the microbes aren’t freezing.
0:19:44 They’re not left out in the sun
0:19:46 to bake in a hundred plus degree weather.
0:19:49 – Just sending a living thing, right?
0:19:52 You’re not just sending a compound, yeah, interesting.
0:19:53 – And if it’s our liquid product,
0:19:56 when they get put into that tank on the planter,
0:20:00 we’re not mixing in some sort of a antimicrobial agent
0:20:02 into the tank as well.
0:20:04 – Which could totally happen in this context.
0:20:05 – Totally, totally.
0:20:08 And that’s to be expected in some respects
0:20:13 because this is a new technology that we’re introducing.
0:20:15 – So just execution, just lots of just like nuts
0:20:17 and bolts logistics execution stuff
0:20:19 that is presumably hard
0:20:23 and the environment is heterogeneous in a way that is hard.
0:20:24 – That’s right.
0:20:26 And then the second thing that’s important
0:20:31 is when we add fertilizer to a field,
0:20:34 there’s a point when additional nitrogen
0:20:36 doesn’t lead to more crop yield.
0:20:38 Something else becomes limiting,
0:20:41 whether it’s the sunlight or a different nutrient
0:20:45 or maybe the total rainfall that that crop receives.
0:20:48 And so there’s a point where you get diminishing returns
0:20:52 on the amount of fertilizer you can add.
0:20:54 Now the challenge is always trying to figure out
0:20:55 what that best balance is.
0:20:58 And that perfect point changes every year
0:21:01 because of how much fertilizer gets washed away by the rain
0:21:03 since the amount of rain is different every year.
0:21:07 And so the biggest challenge we have is trying to figure out
0:21:12 how do you get a farmer to get the best possible experience
0:21:14 when they’re first using our product
0:21:16 to really build up the confidence
0:21:19 in getting to a better outcome each year
0:21:22 when the most variable thing in that whole equation
0:21:23 is fertilizer.
0:21:26 – You really want it to work the first time.
0:21:27 Like that’s a big one for you, right?
0:21:30 The first year you really want it to be great, yeah.
0:21:34 – And so there’s a lot of things that can separate
0:21:38 the perfect amount of nitrogen in the crop
0:21:40 from turning into a perfect amount of yield,
0:21:44 whether it’s pest pressure or droughts
0:21:48 or other types of nutrient limitations.
0:21:51 And so everything we try to do is to set that farmer up
0:21:54 to see the healthiest possible crop
0:21:57 and put them in the best position to realize
0:22:00 the potential yield of what that crop can produce
0:22:03 and do it in a way that really can overcome
0:22:06 the unpredictability of the fertilizer involved.
0:22:08 – So how big is Pivot?
0:22:11 Like how many acres of farmland
0:22:15 have your microbes in them this year?
0:22:19 – Well, so Pivot has been around for a bit more
0:22:22 than a decade and our products have been in the marketplace
0:22:25 for just about five years.
0:22:27 We’ve been able to deliver nitrogen
0:22:31 on more than 10 million acres across that time.
0:22:36 So millions of acres of products being used
0:22:38 just this year alone.
0:22:41 And we’re in a spot that our products are used
0:22:44 on corn crops across the US,
0:22:47 on wheat and sorghum, sunflower, barley,
0:22:48 some other small grains.
0:22:51 And we’re in the process of being able to establish
0:22:55 an international presence in places like Brazil
0:22:57 with an eye towards Canada as well.
0:22:58 – Is it right?
0:23:00 I mean, the idea at this point is not
0:23:04 to replace fertilizer, but to supplement it?
0:23:08 – Today our microbes are supplying about a quarter
0:23:10 of the nitrogen that the corn crop needs.
0:23:12 – Okay.
0:23:14 – And it’s something where we have the ability
0:23:16 to keep improving our microbes,
0:23:19 improve their ability to make that enzyme
0:23:21 and share the ammonia back with the crop
0:23:24 and improve their ability to match up perfectly
0:23:27 with that life cycle, the growth spurts in the plant.
0:23:32 So we’ll see that our products can become even a bigger portion
0:23:35 of the total nutrient supply the crop needs
0:23:38 and allow farmers to really start focusing on
0:23:41 what’s the next big challenge that prevents them
0:23:44 from reaching the full potential yield
0:23:46 that’s baked into the crop genetics.
0:23:52 – After the break, the best and worst things
0:23:55 about trying to sell a new product to farmers.
0:23:57 (upbeat music)
0:24:07 – What are you trying to figure out next?
0:24:10 Like what’s the lab side of your business look like now?
0:24:15 – We’ve been breeding crops for many, many years
0:24:19 for decades, for centuries, and especially
0:24:21 over the last century with an intensity
0:24:25 and a set of technologies that have been unprecedented
0:24:26 in our history.
0:24:29 And we’ve underappreciated and not even known
0:24:33 about the microbes in the roots of a plant
0:24:35 until just recently.
0:24:39 So our ability to tap into getting microbes
0:24:41 to capture as much of that sugar
0:24:43 that the crop can provide,
0:24:46 being able to efficiently grow in tandem
0:24:48 with the roots of the plant,
0:24:51 being able to share ammonia back with the crop
0:24:54 and do that in a way that is really tuned
0:24:58 with the metabolism of how a crop produces grain and yield.
0:25:03 There’s a lot of opportunity to not just discover new science
0:25:06 but turn that into products that really can supply
0:25:09 all the nutrient needs of the crop and beyond.
0:25:11 I think we are very much in the early days
0:25:15 of what can be a transformational technology
0:25:19 and segment of the industry for decades to come.
0:25:21 – What’s an interesting constraint you’re trying to solve
0:25:23 for at a technical level?
0:25:26 I mean, if you have a new idea for an app in Silicon Valley,
0:25:30 you can program it and launch it or test it out
0:25:32 as fast as the pace of thought.
0:25:36 And in agriculture, everything we do
0:25:39 is centered on how fast a plant grows.
0:25:40 There are many parts of the world
0:25:42 where you can grow just one crop every year.
0:25:45 And so if we had a new idea and we wanted to test it out,
0:25:48 it might be just one experiment per year that we’ll do.
0:25:50 – So your rate limiting step
0:25:52 is that you gotta wait for the plants to grow.
0:25:53 Now, one of the things we’ve done at Pivot
0:25:57 is we have built the most sophisticated models
0:26:02 of how a micro behaves and how what we do
0:26:06 with the gene editing rewires when it chooses
0:26:07 to make nitrogen.
0:26:09 And we can integrate that with all the world’s best models
0:26:14 of how crops grow and a footprint that allows us to do
0:26:20 real world experiments at a scale never before seen.
0:26:22 Those things let us be able to tackle problems
0:26:27 in a more efficient way or experiment digitally
0:26:29 long before you ever do something in the physical.
0:26:31 – But you still gotta grow the corn
0:26:32 and see if it really works.
0:26:34 – But you still gotta grow all those crops.
0:26:38 – I mean, well, let’s talk about sort of the future
0:26:41 of chemical fertilizer in particular ammonia, right?
0:26:45 Super energy intensive would be wonderful
0:26:47 if you could put it out of business.
0:26:50 But what’s that story?
0:26:52 – Well, I don’t think that the fertilizer business
0:26:54 and the Haber-Bosch process of making ammonia
0:26:56 will go away anytime soon.
0:26:58 And that’s not a bad thing.
0:27:03 It’s not a thing where I think we are successful
0:27:06 only if the fertilizer industry goes bankrupt.
0:27:09 I think this is something where this is an opportunity
0:27:12 to be able to do better and reach new places
0:27:16 through a very innovative disruptive technology.
0:27:20 We’re a better way to spend new capital.
0:27:25 Our ability to expand our footprint, our supply chain,
0:27:28 is radically cheaper than building a new Haber-Bosch facility
0:27:30 that’s gonna cost billions of dollars
0:27:33 and take a decade to get operational.
0:27:36 We’re really just like a microbreem
0:27:40 making a handful of bakers yeast.
0:27:43 And that is transformational.
0:27:48 It means there’s a lot more efficiency
0:27:52 both in dollars and just physical time invested
0:27:56 to be able to complement what the fertilizer industry
0:27:57 is set up to be able to do.
0:28:00 – I know that the context we’re talking about,
0:28:03 there’s a ton going on and there’s chemical fertilizer
0:28:05 and there’s pesticide and the plants themselves
0:28:08 are these weird super plants that we’ve bred.
0:28:11 And yet still I wonder when you’re changing
0:28:16 the genome of this microbe, like, is there any worry
0:28:20 that you’re gonna mess up the microbiome
0:28:23 in some unintended consequences kind of way?
0:28:28 – There’s a lot we do to make sure that we understand
0:28:31 how our products work, that they are fitting
0:28:36 into the crop system in a very smooth, elegant way
0:28:41 that they go back into the native microbiomes
0:28:46 where they came from and they’re performing just like before.
0:28:49 One of the things we know is that when we do the gene editing
0:28:51 to turn on nitrogen fixational,
0:28:55 it makes the microbes less resilient, less robust
0:28:57 than their original parents.
0:29:01 That means that they die off more quickly
0:29:03 than the native microbes do.
0:29:05 So when we do testing, we don’t see any traces
0:29:08 of our microbes left in the roots
0:29:10 once the crop really gets to the point of harvest.
0:29:15 Just natively, the crop, when it’s harvested,
0:29:16 it stops making those sugars.
0:29:19 So the microbes in the soil die off
0:29:23 when there isn’t a parent crop to defeat it.
0:29:26 But we especially see that with our products.
0:29:29 – So you’re still a small company.
0:29:32 What might go wrong?
0:29:35 Like, what are some reasons, you know,
0:29:37 things might not work out the way you hope?
0:29:42 – I think the mode we’re in right now with Pivot is,
0:29:45 we have this great disruptive technology.
0:29:49 We have built a business model that is innovative
0:29:52 and allows us to get our products into the marketplace
0:29:54 when it’s typically been very hard
0:29:55 to innovate in agriculture.
0:29:58 And now we have the challenge of how do we bring that to scale
0:30:01 and how do we touch as many lives around the world
0:30:06 as we can, all while we’re trying to manage our cash reserves
0:30:09 and what it means to have a growing team
0:30:10 that needs to figure out how to work
0:30:13 in more places around the world.
0:30:16 That’s a lot of operational risk.
0:30:20 And I think the challenge that we face is,
0:30:23 there’s a chance that all might not work out.
0:30:28 I think that the real risk is that we’re not able
0:30:31 to move fast enough to be the leading innovator in the space,
0:30:33 that there becomes competition that slows us down
0:30:35 and trips us up.
0:30:38 – So in that universe, somebody’s gonna do what you’re doing.
0:30:39 The question is, is it gonna be you
0:30:41 or is somebody gonna be you?
0:30:45 – 100%, like what we’ve been successful
0:30:50 is really showing the potential of where microbes in general
0:30:55 and nitrogen fixation specifically can change agriculture.
0:30:56 It will happen.
0:30:59 We will see a transformational shift
0:31:04 in how our agricultural systems around the world operate.
0:31:06 And I think the operational risk for pivot
0:31:09 is all about whether we are gonna be the ones
0:31:13 who lead the way in bringing the change to the world.
0:31:17 – So if you think about the work you’re doing
0:31:20 and project ahead, often I’ll say five years,
0:31:21 but given as you pointed out
0:31:23 that you gotta wait for the corn to grow every year,
0:31:25 let’s say 20 years.
0:31:26 If you think I had 20 years
0:31:30 and things happen the way you want them to happen,
0:31:31 what’s the world look like?
0:31:38 – I’ll hit on three things that I think
0:31:40 are gonna be important to pay attention to,
0:31:44 either because it’s places we’re investing internally
0:31:47 to improve what we do, how we bring that,
0:31:49 a spotlight to these topics,
0:31:52 or the potential of where this could ripple.
0:31:56 One of them is, I think we’re gonna see
0:32:00 a continued trend of improving agricultural productivity
0:32:03 with better efficiency and especially better resiliency.
0:32:07 And when it becomes even more challenging every day
0:32:09 to be a farmer and turn a profit every year,
0:32:12 I think that we’re gonna have a big impact
0:32:16 on the continuity of our agricultural system.
0:32:17 So that’s the first one.
0:32:19 And the second one for me is,
0:32:23 we’re seeing a massive potential impact
0:32:26 on the entire sustainability of agriculture.
0:32:28 So just in the last two years,
0:32:33 we’ve seen that replacement of fertilizer by our customers
0:32:37 has translated to nearly a million metric tons
0:32:39 of avoided CO2 emissions,
0:32:43 either the CO2 from the Harbor Wash manufacturing process
0:32:45 and the transportation of fertilizer
0:32:49 or the prevented nitrous oxide emissions
0:32:51 from fertilizer degrading in fields.
0:32:53 And we’re just getting started.
0:32:54 So that sustainability impact,
0:32:57 whether it’s clean air or clean water
0:33:00 or healthier soils is going to have the potential
0:33:04 to really multiply across the decades to come.
0:33:09 And then I think the third is about really food security,
0:33:15 whether it is the ability of more industrialized,
0:33:20 agricultural regions like the Midwest and the US
0:33:25 being even more capable of producing at higher efficiency,
0:33:27 independent of some of the uncertainties
0:33:29 of global supply chains,
0:33:31 or places like Sub-Saharan Africa,
0:33:35 where there are very uncertain supply chains for fertilizer.
0:33:37 The chance is that a farmer there
0:33:40 may not even be able to acquire fertilizer.
0:33:43 And if they can acquire it,
0:33:44 usually on a price point,
0:33:47 that far exceeds the value of using fertilizer.
0:33:52 So it’s an ability to take many parts of the world
0:33:53 and have access to the nutrients
0:33:55 that are needed to fuel a crop
0:34:00 in a way that can decouple many of the limitations
0:34:02 of the traditional supply chains.
0:34:04 So I think those are the three big areas
0:34:07 that I see some really exciting opportunity
0:34:08 in the decades ahead.
0:34:11 (upbeat music)
0:34:15 – We’ll be back in a minute with the lightning round.
0:34:17 (upbeat music)
0:34:28 – Um, almost done.
0:34:31 We’ll just do a lightning round and then we’ll be done.
0:34:33 Do you have a garden?
0:34:35 – I do.
0:34:38 – What did best for you this year?
0:34:40 What was your, what was the hit of the garden?
0:34:42 – Well, I, my kids,
0:34:43 I’ve got a seven-year-old and a 10-year-old
0:34:45 and we love gardening together.
0:34:48 I think pumpkins are always fun.
0:34:51 I, we grow a lot of flowers
0:34:53 that my daughter loves to grow.
0:34:56 So zinnias and dahlias are the ones
0:34:58 that are high on her list.
0:35:03 – What’s your second favorite element?
0:35:08 – Well, I will go with oxygen.
0:35:12 I think it, it is both such a fuel
0:35:14 for keeping us alive.
0:35:18 But I also, I love wine and everything
0:35:21 from viniculture and inology
0:35:23 and oxygen is usually the enemy of wine.
0:35:26 So oxygen is, is both powerful
0:35:30 and, and also something that can really be a challenge
0:35:31 for not just wine,
0:35:34 but the enzyme of nitrogen fixation itself.
0:35:37 – What was the last time you played the trumpet?
0:35:42 – Oh man, that’s a good question.
0:35:43 It’s, it’s been a while.
0:35:44 It’s probably been a decade.
0:35:47 – There was another version where you were like,
0:35:48 it’s right here.
0:35:49 That was my dream.
0:35:57 What’s the best thing about working with farmers?
0:36:02 – In a world where so much seems more virtual
0:36:03 or digital all the time,
0:36:06 being able to get back to something physical,
0:36:11 something that, that just requires a lot of hard work
0:36:14 in person.
0:36:18 That makes for some really invigorating conversations
0:36:21 and just a lot of times that a shared appreciation
0:36:22 at the end of a day,
0:36:25 a end of a hard work to sit down together
0:36:27 and, and spend time together.
0:36:30 – What’s a hard thing about working with farmers?
0:36:35 – Well, on one hand, a farmer needs to be risk averse.
0:36:38 So any new technology, any new innovation,
0:36:39 it’s not like you can just download a new app,
0:36:40 try it out and delete it.
0:36:43 – Right, it’s a huge downside if it’s not good.
0:36:45 – You might go out of business and lose that family farm
0:36:46 that’s been around for generations
0:36:48 if you make the wrong bet.
0:36:51 So the hardest part about trying to bring new technology
0:36:54 on the farm is figuring out the risk portion
0:36:56 of trying something out.
0:36:57 So farmers want to experiment,
0:37:01 but just do it in a way that is risk averse.
0:37:04 And then the challenge with a lot of us
0:37:07 that don’t live on a farm is we don’t appreciate
0:37:10 just how sophisticated that farm is
0:37:12 and how sophisticated that ability
0:37:14 to experiment without risk
0:37:16 or without unnecessary risk really is.
0:37:19 And so how do we talk to each other in a way
0:37:21 that moves ideas as fast as possible,
0:37:25 especially when we only grow one crop a year?
0:37:27 Like that is the hardest part about this whole thing,
0:37:29 bringing innovation into the world
0:37:32 is there’s a fundamental slow pace,
0:37:37 a need to be able to minimize risk to the negative
0:37:40 and a real opportunity to work with
0:37:44 some of the most innovative, forward-thinking entrepreneurs
0:37:47 and business owners that exist in this world.
0:37:49 If only we can figure out how to all communicate
0:37:52 in something that isn’t common terminology
0:37:55 and familiar for most of us.
0:37:58 – Thank you, it was great to talk with you.
0:37:59 – Thank you as well.
0:38:02 (upbeat music)
0:38:04 – Karsten Temi is the co-founder
0:38:07 and chief information officer at PivotBio.
0:38:11 Today’s show was produced by Gabriel Hunter Chang.
0:38:13 It was edited by Lydia Jean Cotte
0:38:16 and engineered by Sarah Brugier.
0:38:20 You can email us at problem@pushkin.fm.
0:38:22 I’m Jacob Goldstein and we’ll be back next week
0:38:24 with another episode of What’s Your Problem?
0:38:27 (upbeat music)
0:38:29 (upbeat music)
0:38:32 (upbeat music)
0:38:42 [BLANK_AUDIO]
The invention of synthetic fertilizer was one of the key breakthroughs of the 20th century. It’s the reason we can grow enough food to feed billions of people. It’s also super energy intensive. Karsten Temme is the co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer at Pivot Bio. Karsten’s problem is this: How can you use the tools of gene editing to get microbes in soil to provide more nitrogen for crops?
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