Gen9, Inc., the pioneer in developing scalable technologies for synthesizing and assembling DNA, today announced that it is accepting entries for its fourth annual G-Prize competition. Launched and exclusively run by Gen9, the G-Prize is an annual contest designed to foster groundbreaking research in synthetic biology. The winning entrants are provided access to extraordinary quantities of free synthetic DNA for use in their research.

For the first time, Gen9 will include DNA variant libraries among the G-Prize awards. Variant libraries are commonly used to screen millions or billions of sequence combinations to engineer antibodies, peptides, or enzymes. Gen9’s libraries are unique in the utilization of a rational design approach, providing scientists with exquisite precision in specifying user-defined content, up to 10 billion variant molecules of DNA. Built on Gen9’s proprietary BioFab® platform, these libraries enable scientists to explore an unprecedented amount of sequence diversity in a whole new way.

“From partnering with key synthetic biology organizations to enabling academics and startups via the G-Prize, Gen9 is empowering researchers to dream bigger and actually realize large-scale projects,” said Drew Endy of Stanford Bioengineering and the BioBricks Foundation, and a co-founder of Gen9. “It’s really great to see more people exploring and working together to imagine and realize what we can engineer with living matter.”

The G-Prize consists of two tracks, one open to scientists working in academic or not-for-profit institutions and a second dedicated to early-stage startup companies. Awards for each track include 500,000 base pairs of synthetic DNA or a combinatorial variant library with up to 10¹⁰ diversity. Winners will be chosen by a panel of independent judges selected by Gen9. Deadline for entries is December 1, 2015.

“When we first launched the G-Prize, we couldn’t have imagined how much momentum it would gain in a short period. It’s an honor to see more and more applications each year for game-changing projects,” said Kevin Munnelly, President and CEO of Gen9. “This year’s addition of our unique variant libraries will no doubt inspire compelling new ideas for how synthetic DNA can be used to address some of the major challenges of our time.”

For more information about the G-Prize, please visit www.gen9bio.com/g-prize.

About Gen9

Gen9 is the premier next-generation gene synthesis company focused on high-quality, high-throughput, automated production of DNA constructs. The Gen9 technology allows for the lowest-cost and highest-quality DNA constructs commercially available. Founded by world leaders in synthetic biology, Gen9 aims to ensure the constructive application of synthetic biology in industries ranging from enzyme and chemical production to pharmaceuticals and biofuels. Gen9 is powering the synthetic biology revolution from our headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Visit Gen9 atwww.gen9bio.com.

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