Six years into our journey at Ansa Biotechnologies, we can proudly say that we have succeeded at building an enzymatic DNA synthesis technique superior to the prior gold standard, the phosphoramidite method. We have pushed synthesis lengths significantly beyond previous limits, unlocking feats such as the direct synthesis of entire, short plasmids as single oligonucleotides. We can write DNA at scale and have synthesized the complete sequence of Yeast Chromosome 1 in 230 oligos spanning about 1kb each, on a fraction of one instrument run, in under 2 days.
This is just a first glimpse at the next generation of DNA synthesis and what it will enable. Our initial focus is on making access to DNA constructs, including complex sequences, much easier and faster, with our first commercially available products, Ansa DNA Fragments and Ansa Clonal DNA.
Complex sequences are particularly difficult to manufacture, and at best, they are typically made by stitching short oligonucleotides together. In contrast, by synthesizing full-length sequences directly as single oligonucleotides and thus bypassing assembly, Ansa delivers complex sequences faster and more reliably than traditional DNA vendors. This includes:
- Strong secondary structures such as ITRs (Inverted Terminal Repeats), which are essential for the development of viral vector-based gene therapies.
- Homopolymers, which are important to generate polyA tails commonly used in mRNA vaccine and therapeutic development. Ansa is able to generate sequences containing A homopolymers up to 140 bp long.
- High/low GC content. Many naturally occurring regulatory sequences such as promoters and UTRs contain regions of extreme GC content. Ansa is able to generate DNA between 15-90% GC.
- Tandem direct repeats such as CRISPR arrays, which enable multiplexed genome editing for research and gene therapy development. Also, promoters needed to tune the expression of transgenes in cell and gene therapy development often contain tandem repeats.
We want to free scientists from spending their time on tedious molecular cloning work and remove the restrictions legacy DNA vendors impose on R&D progress. But we won’t stop there — our platform technology will benefit the scientific community in many application areas, including enabling the generation of novel types of libraries, and the manufacturing of nucleic acids beyond DNA.
Our mission at Ansa is to accelerate progress in life sciences, and to support you in making the next scientific breakthroughs. Learn more about how we can help you get the complex DNA you need.