Empowered Patient Podcast

Francisco Salva, President and CEO of Azitra, Inc., is leveraging the microbial bacteria that comprise the skin microbiome and exploring novel methods to deliver precision medicines to the skin. Azitra has genetically engineered specific strains of these microbes to produce proteins that are missing in patients with skin conditions like Netherton syndrome and cancer therapy-associated rashes. These bacterial strains have the ability to get beneath the stratum corneum and turn into miniature factories to make the therapeutic proteins and help the skin return to homeostasis. Francisco explains, "We're leveraging the billions of microbial bacteria that naturally live on us and are synergistic with our skin to help keep our skin in homeostasis or a regulated standard of existence. These bacteria makeup that are known as the skin microbiome, we have built up a library of these microbial bacteria strains commonly found on normal people and characterize them in a way that allows us to look for specific strains that