Future Of Agriculture

  Fatma Kaplan and Cameron Schiller are the founders of Pheronym, an agricultural biotechnology company that develops safe and nontoxic solutions to protect a wide variety of plants. Their flagship product is based on pheromones which is extracted from microscopic roundworms called nematodes. Fatma is Pheronym’s CEO/CSO and is an accomplished scientist with a Ph.D. in Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology and postdoctoral training in Natural Product Chemistry. Cameron is the COO and has extensive experience in entrepreneurship with a bachelor’s degree in economics and a Master of Science degree in pharmacy healthcare management.   Fatma and Cameron join me today to discuss their pheromone-based pesticide and how it can improve the agricultural landscape in the future. They describe the primary problem regarding nematodes, what inspired them to investigate the use of pheromones as a pesticide, and what eventually lead them to make nematodes work for farmers instead of against them. They also explain the scie