Milestones
- US launch in restaurantsMay 2023Complete.
- Pairwise stops marketing, shifts to licensingFeb 2024Complete.
Most important updates
Current obstacles
- Retail economicsSpecialty greens proved hard to sell profitably as a branded product.
Physics limits
- The bite is the plant's own defenceThe mustard-oil reaction evolved to repel insects. Switching it off makes leaves milder for people and potentially tastier for pests, which can mean more crop protection is needed.
- Mustard has two genomes, so genes come in pairsBrown mustard is a hybrid of two ancestral species, so most genes exist in several copies. All relevant copies must be edited to remove pungency, which multiplies the editing work.
How it works
Bite
Why mustard tastes hot
When a mustard leaf is chewed, an enzyme mixes with stored sulfur compounds and makes pungent mustard oil in seconds.
Edit
Switch off the heat
CRISPR was used to switch off the genes that make that enzyme, so the leaf keeps its nutrients but loses most of the bite.
Grow
A normal crop afterwards
The edited plants contain no foreign DNA and are grown and bred like ordinary mustard greens.
Papers & demos
- May 2023demoConscious Greens launch (opens businesswire.com)First CRISPR-edited food sold in the US.
Update log
Feb 2024
- Minor: Pairwise stops marketing Conscious Greens to focus on new gene-edited cropsPressCommercial
May 2023
- Major: Pairwise launches Conscious Greens, the first CRISPR-edited food in the USPressCommercial
About Pairwise
Pairwise
CRISPR crops, seedless blackberry, Fulcrum platform
Gene-editing company in Durham, North Carolina, co-founded by CRISPR pioneers. It sold the first CRISPR-edited food in the US in 2023, is developing fruit like a seedless blackberry and pitless cherries, and licenses its Fulcrum tools to Bayer and others.
- Its milder mustard greens launched in 2023; it stopped marketing them in 2024 to focus on licensing and higher-value crops.
- Unveiled the first seedless blackberry in June 2024; it cleared USDA review and heads to grower trials.
- Builds its own editing tools, including base editors, so it doesn't depend on standard CRISPR licences.
- Founded
- 20179 yrs
- Headquarters
- United States
- Status
- Private
- Valuation
- private
- Raised
- $90M1 round
- Last round
- Series B · $90MJan 2021
- Works in
- AgricultureGene-edited cropsBiotech
- Coverage
- 2 programs · 10 updateslatest 2d agochecked 25 Sep
- Lead investors
- Deerfield Management
- People
- Tom Adams (opens pairwise.com)Co-founder & CEOHaven BakerCo-founder