Alex Hutgalung

Alex Hutagalung is a scientist with more than 12 years of expertise in engineering yeastfor industrial fermentation processes. Alex Hutagalung received his PhD in Biochemistryfrom Baylor College of Medicine while studying chaperone and muscle biology in thesoil nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. He obtained a postdoctoral fellowship to studythe cell biology and mechanisms of exocytosis in yeast at Yale University and UC SanDiego. His professional career in metabolic engineering and industrial biotechnologystarted at Verdezyne, an industrial biotechnology company producing nylonintermediates using genetically engineered yeast. The raw material for the process wasfatty acids derived from the vegetable oil industry. From Verdezyne, Alex startedLevadura Biotechnology with Pyrone Systems co-founder Brian Conn to producecannabinoids from fatty acids and developed the technology to secure a patent for theprocess. He recognized the unique advantages of using fatty acids as a substrate forbiosynthesis of natural molecules such as polyketides and isoprenoids. The generalapplicability of the new patent led to the pivot towards producing the small polyketidetriacetic acid lactone (TAL) from fatty acids as the starting point for Pyrone Systems.