13. Waste Is A Failure of Imagination. Meet Nicole Richards of Allonia

[00:00:00] karl: Hey rum. How are you today? I'm doing well. How you doing, Carl? Good. I know you're not doing that well because your team lost the Super Bowl.

[00:00:08] erumm: I know our precious eagles, I am and don't tell. I am my friends, but I am a fair weather fan. My friends know that my, not my immediate friends don't know that.

[00:00:17] erumm: Eagles living a lot because it is where I grew up. A lot of my friends and family love them, so you know, the fact that they're bummed, I'm bummed, but hey, like they got to the Super Bowl. They won a Super Bowl a few years ago. Everyone has their moment in the sun, and congratulations to the Kansas City

[00:00:33] karl: Chiefs.

[00:00:33] karl: It was an incredible game. I'm also a Fairweather football fan and I really enjoyed the game. I thought the Eagles came on super, super strong and very aggressive, so I really admired that about them. But the Chiefs came on. From behind and just dominated. So I think if you're at least for me, it was just enjoying the game itself was really what was so fun.

[00:00:55] karl: And then, Rihanna with her, being pregnant, which is all about biology and there was nothing that really stood out for me on the commercials. Usually I watch a Super Bowl for the ads and. I can't remember one.

[00:01:08] karl: Yeah, except for the movie ones.

[00:01:10] erumm: Yeah, the movie ones were really great. I wasn't really watching it too much cuz I had my little two year old to, to watch and monitor cuz we were at a party and he was just getting his hands and everything but he really had a good time. He's gonna have a great time this week cause it is his birthday.

[00:01:27] erumm: he'll actually officially be two. On Friday, so I've amazing. I've been busy planning that and like the amount of stuff to get for a birthday party. Is just insane. And I'm trying to be more sustainable. And I'm think I have a list of things to get and it's goodie bags and like balloons and I'm like, okay, I don't wanna get plastic bags.

[00:01:48] erumm: But there's cardboard boxes, so I'm looking at like sustainable alternatives, but it has to be like some stuff. Like my birthday party, there was a bunch of different plastic. No, it was in the eighties. It was a different time. , everything was processed. I'm trying to make cupcakes and I'm like, okay.

[00:02:03] erumm: I looked at the ingredients in the Duncan Heins icing and it was just like all chemicals. I don't even think the word sugar was in there. I think it was something like, I probably think a high toast corn syrup, right? But I was like, okay, I have to make something from scratch. kids' birthdays are like a huge industry andit's ready for disruption.

[00:02:21] karl: I think someone could come along. and start a business that is just sustainable birthday box. , everything in the box is completely sustainable, compostable made from bio-based materials, and I think that could be a tremendously huge business. we haven't talked about it on the pod, but we have talked about.

[00:02:39] karl: Having merch for events that we produce with our friends, at these various biotech companies like Poly Bion or Fiber or Bulk, companies that are producing a lot of product for events especially, that is a huge market and all those event companies, so much of the swag that they produce is just.

[00:02:56] karl: Plastic. So I think birthday parties and event swag are ready to be disrupted by bio-based products. So someone out there, if you start that company, let us know. We want to talk to you, . Yeah, and I think it, it speaks to the idea of you're looking for sustainable stuff. We in New York City are now composting a lot.

[00:03:14] karl: This month I'm responsible for putting our composting bins out and bringing them in for our building. And the city does produce between eight and 12,000 tons of garbage per day. I'm not sure how much of that is compostable, but it is a significant amount, and I do think that's a huge opportunity for biotech c.

[00:03:33] erumm: Yeah, it's definitely a significant amount because I've noticed that there are composting bins on the corners of the streets and the neighborhoods of Brooklyn, and so I just noticed it. They have a QR code on it. I took a picture of it. So basically what, Brooklyn can do is just, take our composting trash and.

[00:03:51] erumm: The in-house composting I have composting bags and I couldn't just put it in there and throw it in the bin. And it's huge. Like it is a little bit of a habit change, like when you're like cooking something take the eggshells, put in the compost, and then take, the egg carton and put it in the recycling if it's like, Cardboard carton.

[00:04:11] erumm: But I've been seeing a lot of foam cartons too. I meant that's just foam styrofoam, which is like the worst. But separating out the trash, it is a practice I've seen a lot. In other countries, like in Japan, there's like a lot of different bins and there's no trash on the streets, but hopefully New York City will get there where we all are very more cognizant.

[00:04:31] erumm: Where we put our waste, we are responsible. It is something that we use and we should take responsibility of putting trash where it is meant to be, and it's good for the world. I do feel better. When I had that practice, there were times in my life where I just didn't, I couldn't compos it just didn't make sense and felt bad.

[00:04:48] erumm: And the biggest thing is, trash won't be sly in your house. Yeah. In your house. Yeah. They like the solution that a lot of these trash bag companies have created are like fabrice scented trash bags. Yeah. It's gross. Yeah. Yeah. So it's it works cuz there wasn't again a time where I could not co compost and I did opt to purchase that, but that's not the solution.

[00:05:10] erumm: So odor. Telling you something's wrong or different or you need to do something about it, don't just let it sit there or

[00:05:16] karl: cover it up. Yeah, I think it's interesting because like you mentioned, Japan and I do remember, seeing these, separate your glass and these different bins in Switzerland when I lived there, which was a long time ago, and many of these European countries have solved that.

[00:05:33] karl: Try to solve it. it is gonna require a habit change because people don't want to change their habits. And we are a consumer society, and so consumer society is, used and discard. But I'm really excited that New York City is taking that step. I know that the city was investing, 3 million I think was the number they were gonna invest with McKinsey to try to figure out how to.

[00:05:53] karl: That kind of behavioral change. And I am very excited. Eventually I really have a dream for us to get the New York City Garbage Commissioner Jessica Tish on the podcast cause she was a person who famously said the rats don't run the city. We humans do because New York City does have a rat problem.

[00:06:11] karl: part of what's exciting about garbage and biotech and what we've seen recently is this idea that new lab, which is part at the Navy yard in Boston, is opening up a biotech space. I think we mentioned that. The New lab in. New lab in Brooklyn.

[00:06:25] karl: The mayor announced that they were gonna put 20 million, I think, into it. And part of it is city money, part of it is state money. And so I think that garbage should definitely be one of the tracks that's part of the new lab biotech space. Yeah.

[00:06:39] erumm: And then one of our friends who we're about to interview, who is going to be on our podcast.

[00:06:44] erumm: Now is Nicole from Lon and you've known her for quite some time Carl?

[00:06:50] karl: Yeah. So just by way of background, Nicole Richards is the c e o of eOne. I believe she will mention it in the interview, but she was recruited to be c e o. She had been in wastewater management. And Alon is a Ginkgo bi work spinoff that's focused on environmental remediation.

[00:07:07] karl: So I've known Nicole for a couple years. You and I had lunch with her in Boston a few months ago. It was a really fun lunch. It was her and j Jake Winter Mute, who's the chief evangelist at Ginkgo Bioworks. And we talked about all things garbage and environmental remediation. So I'm excited for this podcast.

[00:07:25] karl: I.

[00:07:27] erumm: Yeah, absolutely. All right. Not from us. Now let's talk to Nicole.

[00:07:31] erumm: Hey

[00:07:32] nicole: Nicole, how are you? Hi. I'm doing great. Thank you.

[00:07:36] karl: We're so excited to have you on this podcast, by the way.

[00:07:40] nicole: Thank you. I've been very excited to join. I think what you're doing in getting this message out is really important to me and I think to, to all of us. So thank you for doing what you're,

[00:07:51] karl: it's a pleasure and it's actually been a ton of fun for us.

[00:07:56] karl: So I'm gonna just, start off by having you introduce yourself, but just to give a little bit of context. a couple months ago we met up with you in Boston. We had this great lunch where we were, just. riffing on fun stuff, and we talked a lot about your company, how to market it, what is the opportunity that you have.

[00:08:15] karl: And jokingly, I wanna say, let's trash talk about what you're working on . And I mean that in the most loving, positive way. Of

[00:08:23] nicole: course, I love it.

[00:08:25] nicole: I can give a little background into why Alonna even exists. and maybe just to start off is along the trash talk line. one of our taglines is Waste is a Failure of imagination and it really sets the stage for how we see the potential in. And for Ionia, what we're really focused on doing is using nature as a solution to heal nature.

[00:08:54] nicole: And so we work on, two main areas. One is remediating waste, that has contaminants that need to be remediated to make our climate healthier. And the second area is look for opportunities where we can create value from waste and really upcycle, materials that can be upcycled and not just be treated as waste.

[00:09:16] nicole: And there's a ton of potential in both of those areas that are really exciting to us.

[00:09:23] erumm: one of the things that you know you're working on is this concept of forever chemicals, and you're the perfect person to speak about this, so can you help us define what are forever chemicals, and are they anything like microplastics and why or am I not?

[00:09:37] nicole: Yeah. Yeah, that's great. And the Forever Chemicals it was the first thing alone you started working on because it is a really important problem to solve in the world so forever. Chemicals are also known as P F A S. Compounds are per fluorinated compounds. And, they have been linked to significant human health effects, things like cancer.

[00:10:04] nicole: Thyroid disease, birth effects, and they are prevalent in our entire globe. we've found them in, polar bears, and in infants. So they really are a problem that is need to be treated. And it's a good example of. When you're in the chemical world, what you think you're doing is good, right?

[00:10:25] nicole: These p ffa s compounds were made to be water repellent. They were made to fight foams, to be in things like Teflon, all things we love, right? we wanna fight fires. We want to, have non-stick pans. So the intention behind creating these chemicals like P F A S chemicals is good. The problem is, We haven't, as a society thought enough about what is the lifecycle impact and what we're seeing decades later from these chemicals if they found their way into soil and water systems throughout the world.

[00:11:00] nicole: And so states and the E P A are now starting to regulate. The levels of P F A S down to very small levels, down to parts per trillion of what's acceptable in soil and water. And so when you think about parts per trillion, these states are regulating them down to single digit cleanups. So just to put that into perspective.

[00:11:22] nicole: One drop in an Olympic size swimming pool is 70 p t. So we're trying to remove these chemicals to very little levels.

[00:11:32] nicole: the amount of. PFAS that has deemed to be tolerable is these very small amounts now.

[00:11:40] nicole: So the states, especially in the US, are really regulating cleanup down to those levels. But that makes it very difficult for existing treatment systems, which is also why it makes it perfect when you think about. Treating that with biology and we believe that this is really the most ideal way to treat contaminants like this.

[00:12:04] karl: that sounds very extreme. part of it, the history that you're talking about with these chemicals sounds like, as many human made, problems, it's like a kind of unintended consequence of these chemicals that give us a lot of benefits, the unintended consequences.

[00:12:19] karl: They're not healthy for us. But what has been the way that people have cleaned these up? had they even been cleaned up until.

[00:12:25] nicole: that's a great question and it is something that we as a society, I think really need to think more about and actually get more involved in. And so a lot of times, unless there is a federal regulation, at least speaking of this from the US perspective, or state regulation.

[00:12:43] nicole: These don't get cleaned up. And so then you think about what does it take to get the federal government to regulate something like this? it's advocacy groups, it's learning more information about what the. Human health issues are,and it's also learning more. Oftentimes it's the chemical companies themselves that are learning more about these that will bring forward some information.

[00:13:04] nicole: but generally we do not clean up. Contaminants unless they're regulated. And so a lot of times it starts with that and then the treatments can begin. Because unfortunately, you think about where our tax dollars go, they go to, municipalities and cleaning up and nobody wants to pay more.

[00:13:24] nicole: So the municipalities are on a budget. So you can see the cause and effect of what this whole environment looks.

[00:13:32] erumm: and you know you mentioned None is regulated. Like something has to happen. And you mentioned there are effects on human health, I'm sure on the environment, on biodiversity.

[00:13:42] erumm: Can you share, like what are some of those outcomes of these chemicals being in our environment?

[00:13:49] nicole: where Ionia tends to focus is on what's called emerging contaminants. we focus on that because that's where we don't have solutions today. and When you think about even just the terminology of emerging contaminants, they're still learning what all these human health impacts are.

[00:14:05] nicole: another one that we're working on is one for dioxine. it's been deemed by the e p A to be a likely human carcinogen. And that is a tie for a lot of these contaminants that we're working on. it's how they bioaccumulate in the body and what the impact really is.

[00:14:22] nicole: And a lot of it, we're still learning.

[00:14:24] karl: you just mentioned it that, the PFOS are so ubiquitous that they even found 'em in polar bears, but I feel like there was a story about something. Every time I see a P f A story, I set it up to you. Cause I was like, look, here it is again.

[00:14:36] karl: so we've talked about this. Problem. That sounds like it's ubiquitous. I would imagine that there's places that are way more polluted than others. what's an example of a place that, it would make sense for aone to go in and help clean it up, number one. And then number two, what, how do

[00:14:49] nicole: you do it?

[00:14:50] nicole: Yeah. a perfect example for the P F A S contaminant one is they are found in high concentrations in. And so why they're found near airports is because you use firefighting foams. And it's not that a lot of plants are catching on fire, but they do a lot of drills. And so you have high concentrations because, P F A S isn't high concentration in those firefighting foams.

[00:15:17] nicole: So we're working in that area a lot, in a lot of, government owned sites, that have these high concentration. So that's one area that we focus. And The other area for P F A S for one four Dioxine that I mentioned in the A third contaminant group that we're working on called Naphthenic Acids.

[00:15:37] nicole: The other high concentration is probably obvious, but it's around the chemical sites that are producing these chemicals. And so napt acids are found. Where they're producing oil sands, up in Canada. So you find naphthenic acids there. You find one for the other manufacturing site. So that's a more obvious, location that you would think of that you can find these.

[00:15:59] nicole: And so our approach just really at a high level is, and I loved learning this because as a chemical engineer, we're not taught this in school, but nature heals itself. If you leave a contaminant, sit in the ground long enough nature will evolve and degrade that contaminant. It's amazing. Like it is literally amazing.

[00:16:20] nicole: now that can take hundreds. It can take thousands of years. And so what we're doing in Ionia is we're hitting fast forward on that solution. So we're taking what already exists in nature that already has an affinity to solve and degrade these contaminants, and we're engineering them to work faster.

[00:16:42] nicole: And so we start with environmental organisms. We call our scientists, nature's detectives sifting through clues because that's what they're doing. Get contaminated soil samples in, we find what nature is already doing and we look to make it better and we look to make it faster and I find that really amazing and inspirational to work on.

[00:17:03] karl: Yeah, I was wondering if you could maybe unpack that a little bit more, because if you're collecting soil samples from these polluted sites, I would imagine that, you're having to look at hundreds, thousands, millions of organisms that are in, a tiny sample of soil. And so how do you find the ones that are actually degrading the chemicals that you want them to?

[00:17:24] nicole: Yeah, no, not a great question. and, I love the statistic that I read. There are more microbes in a teaspoon than there are people in the world. So like that gives you an idea how much sifting you need to do. and so to your question, what we'll oftentimes do is we'll take.

[00:17:43] nicole: Those samples and we'll do different levels of isolation of those, and then we will introduce them into an environment that has a lot of that contaminant that we're trying to degrade. the early part of this work is pretty manual, that you're really looking to find ways to, isolate the organisms, grow them on the contaminant, and find which ones thrive and survive in that environment or have activity in that environment.

[00:18:10] nicole: And so that's where we start and we narrow that down into. hundreds. And then we narrow that down into tens to find the best one. And then we start coming up with an engineering plan because all of that gets you to what has the affinity to do the functionality that you need, and approximately what is the efficiency of that, and what efficiency do we need to be at in order for this solution to be impactful?

[00:18:36] nicole: How long does that process take? So what, when we start a project like that, the first phase of it that I talked about is months. So think three to six months before we have that ending point, which is starting best starting point, level of efficacy and identification of what needs to be done from there.

[00:19:01] karl: So you go to a site, you get some contaminated samples, you figure out what microbes thrive on that contaminant. Then you, grow those up, in some quantity so that you can take 'em back to the site and clean up the site, or take 'em to another polluted site that has the same chemical problem.

[00:19:21] karl: What happens to those microbes once, the contaminant is gone?

[00:19:24] nicole: I'll back up a little bit from your question too. so there's a point in there of, once we identify what natural organism is working, that could be the end. In fact, we're working on this one four dioxine problem.

[00:19:38] nicole: We just ran our first trial with that, with a natural organism that completely degrades one foreign dioxine. and it does it in a very fast period of time. It's a natural organism, and that could be the end solution. So when you think about what happens to that, when you introduce a natural organism into the ground, that has an affinity for degrading the one four dioxine, but might not be, and likely is not native, otherwise you wouldn't have the contaminant to begin with.

[00:20:05] nicole: And the amount we're adding is pretty inconsequential to what's already there in the natural environ. So those organisms oftentimes will grow and they'll continue to feed on that contaminant. And if the contaminant is not there, they'll go through that natural life cycle of an organism and they'll die and become biomass or they'll continue to grow.

[00:20:27] nicole: That's the normal cycle of an organism. Anyway, we're just introducing. A new one into the environment. But another key part of what we do is, let's say that natural organism isn't good enough. It's degrading P F A S at 3% and we need it to de degrade P F A S at a hundred percent or de fluorinate.

[00:20:46] nicole: That's really what we're trying to do with P ffa s is take the flooring off of that carbon chain, and it's just not good enough. And that is the case in P F A S. So then we have to figure out how do you engineer. So that you can improve it enough that then you can introduce it into the environment.

[00:21:03] nicole: and so that's a bit of a different development track and it's also a bit of a d different, analysis on how do you go through that regulatory process to bring a engineered organism into the environment.

[00:21:16] karl: Yeah, I was gonna say,

[00:21:17] karl: Is there community acceptance? I'm just thinking about, this whole thing about, introducing engineered mosquitoes to fight malaria or,engineered mice so that when they get bit by fleas, they're. sharing the plague or things like that, which requires a lotof community involvement.

[00:21:35] nicole: Yeah. So for engineered organisms, there's a regulatory system that's set up in the US that you go through the process and it's treated almost like a chemical. And if it's on a chemical, if your organism is on this registry, Then you go through, one track of the approval process, which you know, is just checking to make sure that the environment is well suited for that.

[00:21:58] nicole: If it's not on your registry, then you have to have it be added and that goes through, a very detailed process on proving that what you're doing, Is safe for the environment and in some ways to make that safe. And things that Ionia is looking at is how do you make that organism, traceable, and how do you make that organism stop?

[00:22:25] nicole: Working once it's done with the functionality and they call that a kill switch. And so we're building these into the organisms as part of that safety measure to help with the regulatory, but also help from the community perspective. we all live in the community too, and we all have the same concerns as everyone else.

[00:22:41] nicole: and what we're doing is to heal the environment. It's our mission and we're driven by that. we want to ensure that's true for anything we do. Got

[00:22:51] karl: it. Yeah, I think that makes sense. .

[00:22:54] erumm: Yeah. And so you mentioned that you're looking for either natural organisms and if you don't find it, you ha would have to engineer organisms.

[00:23:01] erumm: And we actually spoke with Kass Smith of Kinko bios. I'm sure you know him and Ionia does work with Ginkgo. What is the relationship, between eOne and Gigo bios and do you have an analogy that our audience can understand regarding

[00:23:16] nicole: that relationship? Yeah, sure. Ginkgo is an amazing company and I'm sure you've heard from Castle about it.

[00:23:24] nicole: When I first tours Ginkgo two and a half years ago, which is when we started up Ionia, it was futuristic. Like it's amazing to see what they have done in the labs, and it really is inspirational as well. And so the relationship between Ginkgo and Ionia is that. Is a spinoff company from Ginkgo. And so we're our own separate owned L L C, completely separate company, of which Ginkgo is a shareholder in our company, so we act very independently.

[00:23:58] nicole: because we are two independent companies, but we have, an ability to work with them and there's a vested interest, in both companies to work with each other. as a shareholder in Ionia, ginkgo Has, interest in making sure that alone succeeds and Andy wants to tap into all that potential in Ginkgo to do some of this engineering work that we're doing.

[00:24:20] nicole: and so what Ginkgo does well, as I'm sure you heard from Cass, is, high throughput, highly automated. leveraging their code base. And so where we need that skillset, it doesn't make sense for us to build it. We'll tap into the ginkgo capabilities for us to do that. Now there's a lot of what we do that's not part of the ginkgo capabilities, and that's why it's a great symbiotic relationship is a lot of the work that we're doing, isn't that, but where we need that engineering, we have the ability to tap into.

[00:24:55] nicole: You had

[00:24:55] karl: said earlier, and I want to come back to Ginkgo in a second, that you were trained as a chemical engineer. So what was the path from, chemical engineering to being part of this, grow everything, biotech, you know world that we're in.

[00:25:11] nicole: as a chemical engineer, I've always been fascinated with manufacturing processes and so I spent a good part of my career actually doing what I mentioned earlier, is making chemistry better, making it work more for what we needed in the world and improving manufacturing processes.

[00:25:30] nicole: The other part of my career was really spent on, Treating processes, treating water processes. And so when I, and I spent about 28 years doing both of those things in the chemical space. So when I started to learn more about biology and synthetic biology specifically, , it just clicked for me that this is the next frontier of development for these spaces, that they don't use it today.

[00:25:57] nicole: And so I kept thinking to myself, it's so obvious to use biology to solve these problems. What are we missing? Like, why aren't people doing it today? And I dug into that question a lot more and what I've realized is that, The time to use biology in these applications that we call waste is now, 20 years ago, it was not affordable.

[00:26:20] nicole: when you think about the cost of sequencing A D N, A mega based pair as an example, what that was 20 years ago and what it is today, It's a fraction of a penny today, right? Correct. So we can afford to work on solutions now for the waste, environment where we couldn't before. And so I think it took our friends and pharma and food and fragrances to pay for all that development that now we can tap into.

[00:26:44] nicole: And so I think we've got the luxury that the time is right to do this, and I've got the perspective to know. That where the limitations have been in the chemical and material spaces that they're just not going to get to the breakthroughs that you can do in biology.

[00:27:02] karl: And when you talk about, the stuff that you're doing to people in the chemical world, what's their reaction?

[00:27:09] nicole: surprisingly, they're leaning into biology as well. if you think about the biggest chemical companies in the world, in your mind, I would guess they're also working on biology now. So they're also spending r and d dollars to think about how can they use biology either to replace some of their chemicals or to aid in those chemicals.

[00:27:34] nicole: And a lot of what we talk about, It's not a silver bullet. You may need different technologies and bring those together to get to the final result, and these big chemical companies are doing just that.

[00:27:47] karl: Yeah, I think we've seen a fair number of investments from, the BSFs of the world into biotech companies, it's no surprise.

[00:27:54] karl: ,

[00:27:54] nicole: yeah. Salve DuPont Dow B. Exactly. We all have different divisions around this. That's really

[00:28:01] erumm: cool. so you mentioned some of those chemical companies and you that you worked, with, airports on the federal side. Who are some of your clients and how are you helping them

[00:28:10] nicole: specifically?

[00:28:11] karl: if you can disclose it, ,

[00:28:12] erumm: you don't tell us their names if you can disclose 'em, but maybe the industries that they're in.

[00:28:16] nicole: Sure. So we're working in three main areas. We talked a lot about the industrial contaminant space, but we're also working in the mining space and in the plastic space and in mining, it's really about how do you valorize the waste, is one area that we're working with them and how do you improve the environmental footprint.

[00:28:35] nicole: and so we're working with a lot of the major mining companies, right now. one that I can disclose because It has been published is we're working in a consortium called M Map, and there's two mining companies in there, Rio Tinto and Tech. and we're all working in this consortium specifically to create the world's largest mining, biome database.

[00:28:57] nicole: and the recognition is. Our solutions for mining exist in the environment. And so specifically, tech and Rio are investing a lot and sending samples from their sites into this so we could understand the microbiome of those sites and really find the solutions. So that's another area that we're working on.

[00:29:18] nicole: And then the plastics is an area that we're looking into, which is degrading things like mattresses, which is a big waste challenge that we have. and the other is nylon. And so when we look at those three areas, there's different, Customers that we're working on. And so a lot of times it could be the liability holder and in the case of contaminants, the government owns a lot of these sites that we're talking about.

[00:29:41] nicole: And they're, really great partners invested in finding solutions, for their contaminated sites. It could be the mining companies themselves that we're working with and we're working with several. And then on the plastic side, it's the polymer producers, largely that we're working on because they're gonna take in the plastics area, what we're doing is breaking down these plastics into monomers that can be reused as raw materials.

[00:30:05] nicole: And so the polymer producers are the ones that are interested to have the sustainable raw material be brought back into their process.

[00:30:12] erumm: that's, that is really interesting because we did speak with, you must know poly, they take, fruit waste and make that into leather. And I was thinking of, have you thought of creating a full cycle cuz you're putting the microbes in the ground, they're, creating ultimate, ultimately a different chemical.

[00:30:28] erumm: Are you. using that chemical, you mining for that chemical. And I know there other companies that are doing that where they're introducing microbes for mining. But it's great that you're doing that. And Iif you could share a little bit more about that and maybe even what you can imagine for the future.

[00:30:43] nicole: Yeah, and I think this really taps into that waste as a failure of imagination, quote, is that, the two areas that we look at to, to upcycle waste is in the metal side and it's in the plastic side. I'll just talk a little bit about the metal side. So there are a lot of waste streams and some of them are coming out of mining.

[00:31:01] nicole: Some of them are other waste streams that contain metals. And so one of them that we're working on is to extract rare earths from these mine waste. It's waste, it's a liability for these mining companies because they have to treat the waste and they have to keep it on their balance sheet for hundreds of years.

[00:31:20] nicole: So they want to find a better way to treat their waste. And if they can create value from that waste, that's a win-win. And so that's perfect for Alonna cuz we've got a customer that's really vested in that solution and we're cleaning the environment. And so you can extract rare earth from these waste streams by finding organisms that have the affinity.

[00:31:41] nicole: To bind and collect these rare earths and then remove them from those waste streams. So it's another example. And then you've got rare earths that are domesticated because 90 to 95% of them right now come from China. So it's an area of national interest. We have them in the waste streams. We have them in our E-way streams.

[00:32:03] nicole: So finding ways to upcycle them is really important and possible with biology.

[00:32:10] karl: Yeah, this is all super amazing. I think it this idea of waste as a resource waste, as a failure of the imagination. I think that. It's something that I feel like is very new in probably like the circular economy people.

[00:32:24] karl: For them, it's not anything new, but I think that in the general consciousness, if we wanna call it that, this idea that waste could be a resource is something that is relatively new and it's something that's of interest to us. Just because, we live in New York City, you live in Boston, we live in these big urban environments that are produc.

[00:32:40] karl: tens of tons of garbage and waste every day. And so what happens to it? typically it gets, put into a landfill. Maybe some of the organic stuff is used, to produce fertilizer. But so much of it is just wasted and it is a resource.

[00:32:56] nicole: And, think you're touching on something that I'm really passionate about is, and I, this is what I love what you're doing too, is that I want people to start.

[00:33:06] nicole: Thinking about what happens to their waste, what happens to their recycle, how do we create less, how do we reuse more? And if we have to waste what happens to that? And let's care about that. and I'm learning with everyone else. Like I, every day I'm trying to learn more about what's happening in these areas and where are the big problems and I think.

[00:33:25] nicole: part of our society, myself included, is convenience, right? So I can buy a mattress in a box and have it shipped to my kid that's in college, and that's easier. Or I can rent, and put it on the top of my car and drive it up. Well what's easier might not be, what's better.

[00:33:42] nicole: And so I'm trying to challenge myself to think what is the impact I have and what could I do differently? And I'd like all of us to think about that a little bit more because I think once we learn more, then we behave differently and I am so impressed, especially with our younger generation that seems to care more about this topic than any of the generations collectively before them.

[00:34:04] nicole: So we've got, a lot of people that are interested in working at Ionia that are interested in what we're doing and really passionate about it, and I find that very inspiring and motivating. Yeah.

[00:34:16] One

[00:34:17] erumm: of the things that I think, for me, and I'm sure you know a lot of young people that I might have seen, Wally, I feel like that movie Wally, we'll put it in the show notes if you haven't

[00:34:25] erumm: seen it before, but it moved me, was like, oh my gosh, like this is the future. There's landfills everywhere. And we just developed technology so much. I would just go outta space and live in out space and just gain weight and just consume and just that's so sad.

[00:34:38] erumm: so I felt just a lot of the things that are on the mainstream have help people think about this differently if they're watching it. Of course. part of this podcast too is to help people understand what are some of the solutions that are out there. How can they think about what's going on in their everyday lives?

[00:34:54] erumm: I agree. Like this thing about the, the younger generation, it really amazes me because, like I have a friend whose daughter, she will not buy any new clothes. she's a thrift store addict. and then we have another friend whose daughter just likes to remake her clothes.

[00:35:10] karl: She'll go to thrift stores and then redo it. , I know re thrifting is a, I think is what they call it. There's another name for it. But to me this is like a good direction to be heading in. I don't know what it does to the convenience part of our lives because I think convenience is very valuable.

[00:35:25] karl: But, I think being thoughtful, as you say, Nicole really makes a differe.

[00:35:28] nicole: And I agree with you. I've heard a lot of stories about people, thinking through even the delivery of their items. Should they, walk to the grocery store and maybe pay a little bit more, or should they have something shipped?

[00:35:42] nicole: And if they do, thinking of the entire footprint, like I just find that, just amazing that we've got a generation that is leaning into that.

[00:35:52] karl: Yeah, I I think the shoe industry. it's some crazy number. I'm gonna get it wrong. But they produce enough shoes to shod, if that's the word, every person on the planet.

[00:36:01] karl: give every person on the planet four pairs of shoes every year. And that's just not sustainable. that kind of growth. So I think that it's like there is a mind. Set shift that has to happen around consumption and convenience. But there's plenty of work for Alonna to be doing in terms of, hey, there's all these places that are polluted that need to be cleaned up.

[00:36:21] karl: And then how, what are the other places where we can turn waste into, a resource or something new?

[00:36:27] nicole: Absolutely. We've had 250 years since the start of the Industrial Revolution. So we have 250 years of stuff to clean up. and so really what we want is two approaches. Let's stop creating waste and let's upcycle the materials and the chemicals where we can and let's clean up the environment from our

[00:36:48] karl: pastin.

[00:36:49] karl: So just, I want to be mindful of time. you, we talked a little bit about your background, but how did you end up at eOne? How did that come about? Because you were working as a chemical engineer, you're working on water, which is something that's very interesting to us as well.

[00:37:02] karl: Can you, can eOne help clean up water, but how do you end up at eOne?

[00:37:05] nicole: it's a bit of a coincidence and it's a bit of covid, I would say. something for me positive that came out of that is I started to have more time to reflect on. what it was I was doing and what I was contributing and how I was involved.

[00:37:20] nicole: and I was working a lot on water treatment, which was very motivational for me. But at the time, I also started reading more about biology and synthetic biology and started learning more about Geno Bioworks. They were, in the news and they've been in the news a lot in the last couple years.

[00:37:34] nicole: And so it really started. Thinking about, these questions of why aren't we using this? Why haven't you never heard of synthetic biology before? What is it, why would we not use this in some of these industries? And so then when I, found out that they were creating a spinoff company about the environment using this, it was really, it just all the pieces fell into place for me of this is what I was meant to do and I'm so excited about it.

[00:38:01] nicole: That's so great.

[00:38:03] erumm: Okay, so this is fairly new. how long has Lonni been around?

[00:38:06] nicole: Almost two and a half years. I thought you were like

[00:38:09] erumm: 10 years like old or something, cuz like the amount of progress you've made. I was, I'm pretty astonished right now. .

[00:38:16] karl: It's startup progress. You're

[00:38:18] erumm: right.yeah. Start progress.

[00:38:19] erumm: Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

[00:38:20] nicole: we like to move fast and the team that, that came aboard, Ionia are, a lot of the early people that came on were similar to myself. We've worked in industry for a number of years and we've run businesses, we've sold products, we've developed things, and so we have a lot of experience.

[00:38:41] nicole: And so I think we can move faster because of that. And one of the hardest things we had to do and have to do is. Is, pick the right areas to focus on. Cause there are, as you can imagine through this conversation, thousands of areas that we could choose to work on contaminants or environmental problems or upcycling of waste problems.

[00:39:07] nicole: For us, really picking the right areas that have the highest probability of success, that biology can work. A proven starting point that biology has been identified in literature to be able to solve this problem and having a marketplace that cares about the solution. So for us, the rubric has to fit.

[00:39:27] nicole: And then once we have all that in, We can move fast through Ionia. We can, create partnerships like with Ginkgo that help us sequence the work to really get it out there as fast as possible because we feel a sense of urgency. we think that there are solutions that exist that we have to find and get them out to when we, where we need them.

[00:39:50] nicole: Yeah.

[00:39:51] erumm: going back to Wally, have you seen landfills? I have seen when I was young, to think I drove past one, I think there was one on our way to New York City, when I was younger. and I was like, oh my God, that's pretty terrible.

[00:40:00] erumm: And I. Feel like seeing something like that, something, if you go there, it's just like creates this sense of urgency. Like,okay, I need to do

[00:40:07] nicole: something about this. It does. Or in New York City, you were talking about the waste there and seeing it on a barn going where Yes. Where's

[00:40:14] karl: it going? Exactly.

[00:40:14] nicole: Where are we shipping this and why did they want it?

[00:40:16] nicole: and

[00:40:16] karl: most people don't think about it, No.

[00:40:18] nicole: and so I was in a landfill, actually, The end of the summer of last year, we were treating p ffa s at a landfill site because if you think about a landfill, all this trash is sitting on there and the landfills, this trash then seeps into the ground, which seeps into the groundwater and the landfills.

[00:40:38] nicole: Can't release this groundwater that has these toxins in it, so they have to clean it up. And so that's what we were there working with the landfill, doing cleaning p ffo s out of the water, but then they were releasing offsite. And it is fascinating. But, and I think if everyone has the opportunity to see the recycle, facilities, to see landfills, you do start thinking differently about what impact you wanna make on the environment.

[00:41:04] karl: Yeah. so growing up we would go to a landfill in central, in the Central Valley of California. by the way, I used to love going to the landfill when I was a kid and just seeing all the stuff and wishing I could go out there and walk around, like it was the coolest thing to me because as a kid, you don't think about, oh, this is everybody's garbage.

[00:41:21] karl: Upstate in Saratoga County where my in-laws live, there's a landfill and it's very regulated. You have to separate, but it's still a landfill. So there must be thousands of these sites, all over the country. All over the world. And I jokingly said it in our conversation in Boston, landfills in the next 10 or 20 years are gonna be gold mines like that is a multi-trillion dollar industry.

[00:41:44] karl: What Ulon is doing in terms of remediating them, but then people who can go in there and turn waste into, biomass or feed for processes. there's a whole industry to be birthed, in terms of landfill remediation and cleanup.

[00:41:58] nicole: There is, and I would say we're really at the start of that.

[00:42:03] nicole: And I think there are some really fascinating companies that are looking at different aspects of this and I think that working together, in this biological space, in this synthetic biology space with other technologies, we have the answers, we'll solve the problems. And I think there's a lot of really innovative.

[00:42:23] nicole: Smart people that care and that are working in this area. and we're excited to, to be on our journey.

[00:42:29] karl: Yeah, we're excited too. just to close things out, Nicole, was there anything that we didn't ask you that we should have asked you?

[00:42:35] nicole: From my standpoint, I think this has been a great conversation. I'd like to, from my standpoint to help, people understand that how amazing nature is and that the solutions to waste exist already, and we're here to find those and help bring those out.

[00:42:56] erumm: we always ask a question. and you seem very inspired biology as we all are, especially those that are listening cuz they're listening for this reason. has there been any, books or movies or anything that also helped you get inspired by biology or at least something that's interesting, about synthetic biology, regular

[00:43:13] nicole: biology.

[00:43:13] nicole: that's a great question, , since being in this area, I've read a lot of kind of fundamental synthetic biology textbooks. just for fun, just don't learn about it more. But really what I've started doing that I think is, something new for me. That also helps keep this on the forefront is watching a lot of the nature documentaries and just, being inspired by what I see there and what nature is and what nature does and reading the articles in a lot of these nature inspired magazines, I think is something that is now part of my everyday world where it wasn't before.

[00:43:50] nicole: Awesome.

[00:43:50] karl: All right. thank you so much, Nicole. we really appreciate it. It's a pleasure to have you on. Can't wait to see your progress and, to check in with you again.

[00:44:00] nicole: Thank you. And thank you for what you're doing and,for your interest in Alonna.

[00:44:05] karl: So what do you think of that interview, IAM?

[00:44:09] erumm: It was amazing. Nicole is someone that I could just be friends with, which I hope, we are friends, I guess now, is that what happens after we interview someone on a podcast? But besides that, we had that lunch with her and she's just, again, nicole is just very, is very intelligent. She's really taking a smart approach because when you create a platform technology, there's a lot of different avenues you can go and that this is ends up becoming a problem for a lot of companies where they make a foundational technology that can solve a lot of problems and they end up going for too much

[00:44:43] erumm: And not succeeding, but Nicole's taking a very phase approach as we heard in the interview, that she could create a product to solve the challenges of landfills, right? But right now she's just focusing on getting P F A S out of the ground, which is very admirable. She's saw the market for, and she's going.

[00:45:04] karl: you hit the nail on the head where you say, it's like a bit of a more holistic solution because while they are focused on these forever chemicals, she also touched on the fact that they're, working on. Rare earth mining, which is something we're very interested in, or at least I am.

[00:45:20] karl: and then landfill remediation, I think I've probably mentioned on the pod, I think is gonna be a multi-trillion dollar industry. And so there's a lot of applications of the work that Eloney is doing. You had something that you mentioned to me before the interview where you said something like, now you didn't use the word holistic, you said probiotic.

[00:45:36] karl: So I'm curious, what did you mean by that?

[00:45:39] erumm: when we talk to a lot of companies and especially those that are working on microbes and culturing microbes, They talk about creating a whole microbiome and ecosystem and we, when we think about microbiomes, we also, we automatically think of Arup microbiome.

[00:45:55] erumm: At least I do. And I think a lot of people in the mainstream do think about the microbiome, cuz you need a whole ecosystem to work together in order to, digest food in the case of our bodies and extract nutrients, and that's what probiotics do, for our bodies.

[00:46:09] erumm: They're there to help our guts And what does that look like for soil? And what Nicole talked about was create engineering organism to take, toxic chemicals out of the ground. she talked about this before, during our lunch, not in this podcast, but what about creating a probiotic for the ground, not only to take the toxins out, but to nourish the ground and be able to grow more things in that.

[00:46:32] karl: Yeah. I think it's interesting because I didn't know this, a teaspoon of soil contains, as many microbes as there are people on earth. It's like some incredible number, but what happens in a lot of. big, huge farms they spray the hell outta the soil and basically kill the microbiome that exists in the soil.

[00:46:51] karl: And so then that has to be rebuilt. And so this idea of having a probiotic for soil is actually really interesting and it speaks to this idea of regenerative farming. And if you go. YouTube and you look for regenerative farms. The contrast between farms that are done, regeneratively, meaning they're taking care of their soil, they're caring for the soil versus those that are just spraying the hell out of it, is really incredible.

[00:47:14] karl: Like the people who are doing regenerative farming they will plant different kinds of crops. They'll rotate out different kinds of crops as opposed to just monoculture, which really allows for the destruction of the soil in the environment and the soil is really important. I think we talked. Documentary that we watched on this.

[00:47:29] karl: I'll just mention that this is something that is of a lot of interest to a lot of people and my son, Tomas, who is a freshman at Cornell, just recently joined a sustainable development team on a club that's focused on soil. I don't know what he's doing. It's called Soil Factory, and I'm very excited for him.

[00:47:47] karl: soil health is a big, topic of.

[00:47:50] erumm: Yeah, one thing which is I'm sure people are thinking like manure is a probiotic for the ground. I don't know the science behind what actual microorganisms from manure interact, like how the whole pathway is mapped out for newer to nourish the ground.

[00:48:10] erumm: But what we're really talking about is engineering organisms. To have a higher performance and better yield and better outcomes. What does that look like? So yeah, sure. You have manure and fertilizer and that's there. And is that being done? And if it is, I, I apologize on behalf of Carl and I that it's already being done.

[00:48:28] erumm: And if you know about that, please write to us and tell us about what are, some fertilizers that are engineered to be high performance.

[00:48:34] karl: I think you would, find and we usually, at messaging lab have one ag client, agriculture client.

[00:48:40] karl: We don't have one right now. You would find that all fertilizers are highly engineered chemicals. But we need all solutions. So we do need highly engineered fertilizers. We also need regenerative farming, and we also need highly engineered bacteria or micro microbes to create this microbiome because we need every solution to every problem, and we should be trying all of them.

[00:49:02] karl: So I think. There's a lot of work to be done. Yeah. I is the bottom line. But yeah, we want to hear from anybody who can talk to us about highly engineered fertilizers and how they work. Another thing that I think we should just touch on and that we should include in the show notes is the fact that there was this humongous earthquake in Turkey.

[00:49:20] karl: I don't know what the number is. I think the last number of deaths I saw was 33,000, which is, a lot of people. We will put a link to where you can donate to the emergency that they're having in Turkey. Yeah, it's a lot of people .

[00:49:33] erumm: I'm sorry, like last time I saw the news it was like 5,000 that just escalated.

[00:49:37] erumm: Really? Oh my god. My heart's just breaking right now.

[00:49:40] karl: Yeah it's crazy. And then just to close things out, I think we should just mention our friends at 2048 vc. They are Julie Wolff is a good friend of ours. We haven't had her on the pod yet, but we've known Julie for many years and 2048 just announced a pitch competition and their venture studio focus on biotechnology.

[00:49:59] karl: So if you're a startup you have a good idea and you're looking for a place where you can get some funding and get some good mentoring. 2040. Could be a good place for you. It's 2048 VC slash bio, and if you're a startup that isn't quite ready to apply to a venture studio, but you want some advice, you can always hit us up.

[00:50:17] karl: We're happy to talk to you.

[00:50:19] erumm: Yep, absolutely. All right everyone. Thanks so much for listening, and we are excited for our next episode. And stay tuned for that.

[00:50:27] karl: Yeah, please. Thank you so much for listening to us. We've had some great growth. We're getting some good support on Patreon and this podcast would not exist without the people who we get to interview and also the people who are listening to us.

[00:50:39] karl: So thank you very much. All right. See you later, IAM. I'll talk to you soon. Bye-Bye.