SB Time Capsule

In the Year 2000...

Shepards in our Midst

By Mary Carpenter

They may look like any other pigmy goats, but the goats grazing near the former Plattsburgh Air Force Base bomb dump at PARC have one very important difference. They are part of a new wave of genetic engineering that will allow the scientists at Nexia Biotechnologies to manufacture recombinant proteins for extreme performance medical and industrial applications.

The company has successfully bred two transgenic founder goats, Peter and Webster, which carry a gene from a spider that will allow their female offspring to produce spider silk in their milk. The spider silk, which consists of strong, light proteins, will be extracted from the goats’ milk and spun into fibers to be used in applications such as bulletproof vests and fine suture materials.

In the early 1990’s Dr. Jeffrey Turner, a professor of Biochemistry and Dairy Science at McGill University in Montreal, was approached by venture capitalists who had followed his research in agricultural biotechnology. “We got together and agreed that it was possible to genetically modify animals in a careful and responsible way and at the same time make products that would be valuable for society,” Turner recalled.

With the help of colleagues at McGill, Turner, who earned his Ph.D. in molecular genetics at the University of Illinois, set out to identify unmet industrial and medical needs. “We soon came to the realization that there was a need for new materials made from high performance proteins,” he stated.

“Nexia Biotechnologies was founded on the belief that sci-entists could harness the dairy industry’s ability to produce complex synthetic proteins on a cost- effective basis. We believed that dairy animals could produce milk for uses other than food,”he offered.

“We spent the last six years working to understand the lac-tation process and how we could introduce a gene into that process to produce important things such as medicines, performance materials for replacement ligaments and ten-dons, as well as a whole variety of industrial materials. We started out with something very modest, and we’ve taken that knowledge and brought it into modern biotechnology.” Nexia is one of only four elite companies in the world work-ing on this technology.”

In 1993 Turner gave up his position as a tenured professor at McGill to found Nexia. What he called the effort”Eureka moment” came about 19 months ago when the research team realized that it could indeed make soluble spider silk. Since that time we have been expanding and refining the concept and moving through the commercialization process,” Turner stated with justifiable pride. Nexia’s researchers were able to replicate their success in mice and a year ago began their goat program.

Asked why he chose goats, Turner explained, “In today’s technology, speed is everything. The speed with which a company can go from a product concept, to a prototype, to marketing defines its success in the marketplace. The choice of the dwarf goat called a BELE goat — breed early, lactate early — offers the fastest production system.”

Nexia has expanded rapidly from its humble beginnings at McGill. The company now has a staff of 65 working in four locations. Research and development is located at the company’s head office in Montreal, two farms west of the city house 500 goats each and the company’s most recent expansion — Nexia USA at PARC in Plattsburgh is home to 100 goats.

A staff of three currently operates Nexia’s Plattsburgh farm. “We will continue to build out at this location,” Turner projected. “Even though some might see our work now as

just the feeding and milking of goats, we need thinking people who will be aware of the animal’s health and the concept of bio-security. We have the cleanest goats in Canada and we’re working on bringing that image to the PARC facility.”

Turner praised the North Country as an area that is in tune with the dairy industry and its needs. “One of the things that attracted us to Plattsburgh was that there was a strong dairy community here and regulations are in place to govern our activities.” Nexia has established contact with the Miner Agricultural Institute in Chazy. “They are internationally recognized dairy scientists. The fit is there,” Turner said.

Nexia is currently in the final phase of its development process and expects to be producing enough milk to begin the spinning process necessary for manufacturing by year’s end. “The filaments will see immediate use, predominantly in ballistics protection,” Turner announced. Beginning in September the U.S. Army is scheduled to test Nexia’s product called BioSteel in its labs in Natick, Massachusetts. “The goal of the tests is to identify a material that will produce superior body armor that will be developed for the military and the law enforcement community. In 2001 we will move into the prototype design phase and hope that in two to three years we will be ready for manufacturing and market adoption.”

The eventual size of the herd necessary for commercial pro-duction will depend on the application. “If we’re making fine medical sutures, we will need fewer than 100 goats to reach the markets we want to reach,” Turner offered. “But if we are going to make a ballistic vest, our initial projection is about 2,500 goats. The chances for expansion of our Plattsburgh operation are very good as we hit the technical and commercial milestones." Nexia's current facility at PARC will hold about 1,500 goats.

Turner smiled when asked about his dealings with the Plattsburgh Air Base Redevelopment Corp (PARC). "It's been unusual, " he began. "It wasn't what we expected. We were expecting a stiff, quasi-government organization. It turned out that the group at PARC was very proactive, very community-based. What really attracted us was PARC's vision. They wanted sustainable businesses coming in. We explained our corporate philosophy and they indicated that it was their philosophy as well. That was great for us. We knew we wanted to go slowly because we want to build a firm foundation for a company that would be here for years to come. We weren't looking to see how much we could get and then disappear in a year or two.

Turner’s enthusiasm for Nexia and its future is unbounded. “We are tremendously excited about the types of biomaterials we can produce using this technology. When it comes to “super fibers” used as filaments, no new material has captured the imagination of the industry since the development of Kevlar in the mid 1960’s. BioSteel is really a family of molecules that is unique in the world. It is the pinnacle of materials science. We are in the process of developing a cable no larger than your thumb that will be able to stop a jet in flight.”

Turner concluded, “Nexia is currently well funded by some of the biggest players in Canadian biotechnology and potential clients are lining up We look forward to being part of a community that offers stable jobs in a growing industry in a world that wants our products.”

The Rest of the Story…

While the North Country has earned an enviable reputation for economic development success, not all projects reach their intended destination. Nexia’s story is a powerful reminder that innovation often lives at the edge of possibility—where ambition, science, and capital collide.

Founded on groundbreaking research and backed by significant investment, Nexia was part of a small, elite group globally attempting to commercialize recombinant protein technologies. Its work—producing spider silk proteins through transgenic animals—captured international attention and represented a bold leap forward in materials science. But as history has shown time and again, being early is not the same as being ready.

Between 2000 and 2003, the company invested more than $45 million in an effort to scale production. The science was sound in concept, but the technical challenges of moving from laboratory success to industrial viability proved insurmountable. When financing tightened, Nexia’s model unraveled, leading to the closure of its Plattsburgh operation and, ultimately, bankruptcy in 2009.

Yet to frame Nexia solely as a failure would miss the larger truth. Its intellectual property lived on, acquired by Kraig Biocraft Laboratories, and its pioneering work helped advance an entire field that continues to evolve today. More importantly, Nexia left behind a legacy of bold thinking—of a community willing to welcome innovation at its most experimental stage.

In the end, Nexia’s chapter in the North Country is less about what didn’t work and more about what it dared to attempt. Progress is rarely linear. Sometimes, the most important contributions are not the ones that succeed outright, but the ones that push the boundaries far enough for others to follow.