With a $4M fed­er­al grant, Lu­men jumps in­to the Covid-19 treat­ment race

It’s been less than a month since Lu­men Bio­science an­nounced a $16 mil­lion Se­ries B to en­gi­neer spir­uli­na — a nu­tri­ent-packed su­per food — for dis­eases like trav­el­er’s di­ar­rhea, norovirus and C. dif­fi­cile col­i­tis. And now, the biotech has pulled in an­oth­er $4 mil­lion to do the same for Covid-19.

The ap­proach is quite sim­i­lar to oth­er gas­troin­testi­nal tar­gets the com­pa­ny is pur­su­ing, co-founders and Bri­an Fin­row and Jim Roberts said. The Seat­tle-based com­pa­ny is work­ing on a camelid an­ti­body cock­tail to com­bat GI in­fec­tion com­mon among Covid-19 pa­tients. In a study pub­lished in the Amer­i­can Jour­nal of Gas­troen­terol­o­gy, a ma­jor­i­ty of Covid-19 pa­tients showed GI and res­pi­ra­to­ry symp­toms, and 25% had on­ly GI symp­toms.

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