iDiverse today announced that it has signed an exclusive license agreement with the University of Nebraska – Lincoln (UNL) to commercialize UNL’s transgenic plant technology, which simultaneously provides plants with resistance to a broad spectrum of diseases and environmental stresses.

In addition, iDiverse signed a research agreement with UNL to expand the work of Dr. Marty Dickman which is the basis for the licensed plant technology.  Dr. Dickman, a Charles Bessey Professor of Plant Pathology at UNL, is also the Scientific Founder of iDiverse and a consultant to the Company.

“We are very impressed with the broad potential for this technology as demonstrated by the results Dr. Dickman and his colleagues have generated in the lab, the greenhouse and especially in preliminary field trials” said John Burr, president and chief executive officer of iDiverse.  “We look forward to a long and productive relationship with Dr. Dickman and with UNL and are eager to aggressively explore the commercial opportunities for this unique technology.”

“With global population approaching 6.5 billion people, the worldwide loss of farmland nearing 25 million acres per year, and an increasing salinity of water for farm irrigation, we need better ways to grow the crops that feed the world,” said Dr. Prem Paul, UNL vice chancellor for research.  “I hope that the plant technology that we are developing here will contribute to helping stave off the very challenging problems our agricultural industry faces.”

“We are pleased to be working with iDiverse in this area,” said John Brasch, UNL associate vice chancellor for technology development.  “They bring the right mix of experience in agriculture, proven accomplishments in entrepreneurial environments, and successes in commercializing innovative technologies – all of which will help drive this program forward.” 

iDiverse, Inc. is a privately-held biotechnology company dedicated to developing transgenic plants that simultaneously resist a broad spectrum of diseases and environmental stresses – all with the addition of only one proprietary gene.  The Company has advanced several plant species through the lab and greenhouse and is conducting field trials on a number of commercially relevant crops.