STTR Phase I: Biophotonic plant foliage optical inspection system for improved indoor molecular farming of plant-based medicines

小企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目的更广泛影响是通过分子药物种植提供安全，可靠，可持续的药物。 室内农场不受天气和气候的影响，通常位于人口中心附近，减少了运输成本和化石燃料的使用。经济优势包括使用植物的低成本药物，使用最少的杀虫剂和除草剂，以及90%的水消耗量。 植物药市场预计每年增长20%以上。在植物中生产药物将加速药物开发，因为在良好的控制环境中加工植物的速度和一致性。该项目将开发和演示一种实时植物叶片光学检测系统，该系统将预测作物中的药物生产并发出植物胁迫信号，使种植者能够修复缺陷并优化生产。分子农业的这些优点可以更广泛地用于农作物食品。 该项目提出了一种精确的化学成像仪，用于二维了解本氏烟草植物叶片中蛋白质和压力源产生的位置、方式和速率。成像仪方法分析医用蛋白质生产和粮食作物生长。该测试计划将修改生产变量，包括引入植物中的专门细菌，以刺激它们产生蛋白质，从而能够对所产生的植物胁迫和蛋白质生产率反应进行指纹识别。为期两周的试验周期将允许快速开发算法，以模拟生产率和优化商业用途。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is to provide safe, reliable, sustainable medicines with molecular medicine farming. Indoor farms are insulated from the impacts of weather and climate and are usually located near population centers, reducing transportation costs and fossil fuel use. The economic advantages include low-cost medicines using plants with minimal pesticides and herbicides, and with 90% lower water consumption. Plant-based pharmaceuticals markets are expected to grow yearly more than 20%. Producing medicines in plants will accelerate pharmaceutical development, due to the speed and consistency of processing plants in well-regulated controlled environments. This project will develop and demonstrate a real-time plant foliage optical inspection system that will predict pharmaceutical production in crops and signal plant stress, enabling the grower to remediate defects and optimize production. These advantages of molecular farming can be used more generally for crop foods. The proposed project advances an in-process precise chemical imager for two-dimensional understanding of where, how and at what rate protein and stressor generation occurs in the leaves of Nicotiana benthamiana plants. The imager method analyzes medical protein production and food crop growth. The test plan will modify production variables, including specialized bacteria introduced into the plants to stimulate them to generate the proteins, to enable fingerprinting the generated plant stresses and protein productivity responses. Trial cycles of two weeks will permit rapid development of algorithms to model production rates and optimization for commercial use.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.