SALT LAKE CITY–(BUSINESS WIRE)–#AI–Seek Labs, a biotech company boldly seeking a healthier world through AI-powered discovery, programmable therapeutics, and point-of-care diagnostics, today announced the inclusion of Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) in its BioSeeker™ Global Disease Atlas, advancing the company’s mission to transform genomic data at scale into programmable, CRISPR-based therapeutics. This expansion highlights BioSeeker’s ability to map high-priority veterinary pathogens and accelerate the development of countermeasures for diseases that destabilize food production, disrupt protein supply chains, and strain economic resilience.
FMD is one of the world’s most contagious livestock diseases, affecting cattle, pigs, sheep, goats, deer, elk, and bison. Outbreaks cause billions in losses through culling, trade restrictions, and market instability. Despite decades of control efforts, FMD remains endemic across Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and South America, with sporadic outbreaks continuing elsewhere. Earlier this year, an FMD-related outbreak in Germany—its first since 1988—spread rapidly into Hungary and Slovakia, the speed at which this virus can quickly spread and upend economic and operational infrastructure in countries where mitigation efforts have previously been successful.
Mapping FMD Weak Points with BioSeeker™
Foot-and-Mouth Disease presents a persistent challenge because vaccines must be tailored to regionally circulating strains, with efficacy dependent on timely surveillance and accurate strain matching. In many countries, surveillance is limited, and vaccine selection can be inconsistent, leaving gaps that allow outbreaks to spread and destabilize food systems.
BioSeeker™ addresses this challenge by scanning thousands of viral genomes across strains to identify conserved, high-value regions essential for viral survival across all known serotypes (O, A, C, Asia 1, SAT 1, SAT 2, and SAT 3). These “genomic vulnerabilities” are designed to remain therapeutically relevant even as the virus evolves, helping to reduce the risk of resistance seen with more broad-use small molecule antivirals. These mapped targets form the blueprint for Seek Labs’ Programmable Target Ablation Platform (PTAP™), which harnesses CRISPR systems to seek and destroy pathogens with genomic precision. By bringing FMD into the Atlas, BioSeeker compresses years of traditional discovery into weeks and lays the foundation for programmable, pathogen-specific therapeutics that could complement vaccines and strengthen global countermeasures.
“Protein supply chains are critical to global health, and transboundary diseases like FMD remind us how fragile they remain,” said Jared Bauer, CEO of Seek Labs. “By adding Foot-and-Mouth Disease to the Global Disease Atlas, we’re providing government and industry stakeholders alike with the genomic intelligence needed to strengthen and safeguard food systems and accelerate the next generation of programmable therapeutics.”
A Global Call to Advance Programmable Therapeutics for FMD
FMD joins African Swine Fever Virus (ASFV), Capripox (Lumpy Skin Disease, Sheep Pox, Goat Pox), and Classical Swine Fever (CSFV) in the Global Disease Atlas, representing high-priority threats to livestock, trade, and protein access. With FMD now integrated, Seek Labs reinforces its commitment to addressing both human and veterinary diseases that destabilize health systems and economies. The company is actively seeking creative collaborators and development partners across animal health, government, and pharma to help advance a pan-targeting FMD candidate into a first-in-class therapeutic.
About Seek Labs
At Seek Labs, we don’t wait for change—we build it. We’re pursuing the breakthroughs the world can’t wait for by developing programmable “seek-and-destroy” therapeutics and point-of-care molecular diagnostics that close the gap between outbreak and intervention. At the core of this mission is a layered architecture: BioSeeker™ serves as the Intelligence Layer, continuously mapping conserved viral vulnerabilities in real time; these insights activate our Deployment Layers (PTAP™ for programmable therapeutics and SeekIt™ for molecular diagnostics), forming a full-stack development engine designed to accelerate response, innovation, and impact across global health.
Headquartered in Salt Lake City, Seek Labs is a proud member of BioHive, Utah’s collaborative life sciences ecosystem. Together with our partners, we’re building faster, smarter solutions for the world’s most urgent health challenges.
Forward-Looking Statements and Regulatory Disclaimer
This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding development timelines, clinical validation, regulatory pathways, and potential collaborations. Forward-looking statements are based on current expectations and assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties—including scientific, regulatory, manufacturing, clinical, and commercial risks—that could cause actual results to differ materially.
Contacts
Bridget Baldwin, Director of Communications, [email protected]
