My name is Melanie Eldridge. I have been working in the microbiome space since 2017 and in microbial ecology and microbiology since the late ‘90s. I’m here to help clients figure out how to make microbes work as therapeutics, probiotics, bioassays, etc. no matter at what stage the game they are. My passion in all of my work is to progress the use of microbes to better the world, whatever the application.

Here’s a bio so you can get to know me a bit (starting from my most recent work): In my last job, I worked at a CDMO called Arranta Bio, leading the microbiome process development team (initially drug substance and then also drug product). During this time, I was constantly/collaboratively working with tech transfer and manufacturing to accomplish a successful process transfer and manufacturing batches, while helping multiple clients develop their strains/consortia. We took products from all phases of development through our process and into manufacturing. We worked on client projects ranging from a hand off of strains immediately post-isolation on which we did the complete Phase I process development then moved into manufacturing to process optimization and scale up of strains that have been developed through Phase III (and everything in between, literally).

In my work prior to the CDMO, I was at a company called Assembly Biosciences where we worked on multiple disease indications, developing nearly 100 strains that our discovery team had isolated from healthy human donors. Our very close knit CMC group, established a platform process for all unit operations and worked on a wide range of strains. This is where myself and colleagues deep dived into microbial strain development for therapeutic applications. In addition, I helped tech transfer the process of strain production to CDMOs, served as an SME during our manufacturing campaigns, and wrote reports which served as sections for our IND filing.

Prior to this work, I was the Microbiology professor at the University of New Haven for a few years. I was a University Research Scholar and a Fulbright Scholar. I had a research program using yeast-based bioassays to detect hormones and toxicity in local waterways. My students also looked at metal-nanoparticle complexes in local waterways using an amphipod model organism. While I deeply enjoy to teach and work with students and did very well in the academic system, I decided to move to industry and start working on microbial strain development for therapeutic purposes.

In my work prior to becoming a professor, I was at the Center for Environmental Biotechnology for almost a decade where I genetically engineered yeast and bacteria to detect environmental contaminants. We developed three yeast strains for the detection of hormones and toxicity (producing bioluminescence upon detection of these compounds). I tech transferred the strains to labs in Brazil and China, where I lived for months at a time to ensure that the bioassay was functional and would be effectively used.

In my graduate work, I studied heterotrophic bacteria and phytoplankton in the open ocean (in response to iron limitation), which is the first place I learned to make very complex media and grow unusual strains (a theme that has continued through my entire career).

Through all of this work, things I have come to understand are that: I know how to grow strange microbes (including scaling them) and I have the heart of a teacher, wanting to help bring this knowledge to others so that they can progress the use of microbes for the betterment of humans, animals, and the environment. I have a lot of experience with helping get unusual strains or consortia into and through manufacturing, in all phases of drug development. If you are looking for someone to walk through this process with you, let’s schedule a consultation and talk through how we can work together.