Just before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the world in 2020, Hao Shi, Ph.D. 20 completed the final experiment of his doctoral research. He had created an advanced imaging tool to visualize the gut microbiome the community of bacteria and microorganisms living in the human intestines and recognized its potential to impact disease treatment.

As we built the company we realized our technology was perfectly positioned as a platform for developing microbiome-based therapeutics said De Vlaminck associate professor of biomedical engineering at Cornell Engineering.

Kanvas’ mapping platform HiPR FISH identifies the microbial species within the microbiome pinpoints their exact locations and uncovers the complex interactions between them. These detailed insights guide the development of live biotherapeutics drugs made from living microorganisms that aim to treat disease by reshaping the microbiome.

Interestingly some patients who respond exceptionally well to immunotherapy have donated their stool to aid others. These super donors provide fecal transplants rich in diverse microbes which are introduced into other patients intestinal tracts. The dramatic improvement in outcomes highlights the microbiome’s vital role in immunotherapy success.

The challenge with fecal transplants is that they’re not scalable you can’t replicate optimize or manufacture them consistently explained Matt Cheng now CEO of Kanvas Biosciences. We asked ourselves: can we identify what makes a super donor unique and develop a therapeutic that mimics that effect for other patients?

To tackle that question the team developed KAN-001, a live biotherapeutic created using their proprietary platform. Acting as a synthetic version of a stool transplant KAN-001 is designed to prime the microbiome and boost patients’ responses to immunotherapy.

Building on this approach the startup also developed KAN-004 a biotherapeutic aimed at managing colitis a common side effect of immunotherapy. By restoring gut health and reducing inflammation KAN-004 could help patients better tolerate treatment. Clinical trials for this candidate may begin as early as next year.

While the company is currently focused on advancing these two drug candidates through clinical testing, the team envisions broader applications for their HiPR FISH platform across epidemiology biology and medicine.

Our technology helps decode the microbiome as a complex system said Shi. We see it as a new organ and understanding it more deeply could have far-reaching implications well beyond cancer.

Source: https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2025/06/kanvas-biosciences-harnesses-power-microbiome