Caravel Bio has secured a $1.25 million Small Business Innovation Research Phase II grant from the National Science Foundation to expand its AI-driven protein engineering platform.
The company also appointed Michał Jastrzębski as Chief Technology Officer to lead its artificial intelligence initiatives and help advance its product and market strategy.
The NSF funding will support development of Caravel’s system for discovering, engineering, and scaling proteins incorporating new-to-nature chemistries.
Caravel’s platform is designed to conduct millions of biological experiments in parallel, producing large datasets that can be used to train machine learning systems for biomolecular design.
Most industrial enzymes, therapeutic proteins, and biomaterials rely on the 20 canonical amino acids found in nature. Caravel is developing technology that allows protein engineers to work with additional amino acids and potentially create proteins with characteristics unavailable through conventional biological chemistry.
The company combines laboratory methods, machine learning, and a design-build-test-learn cycle in which experimental results improve predictions for subsequent rounds of protein design.
Caravel formally launched in October 2025 alongside a $7.8 million award from the NSF Directorate for Technology, Innovation and Partnerships.
The company has also joined the Shell GameChanger program to develop ultra-stable enzymes for lower-cost carbon capture. Caravel said it increased enzyme stability under industrially relevant conditions twelvefold within six months.
Its scientific and strategic collaborators include Avery Bio, Caltech, Rutgers University, Oregon State University, Southern Connecticut State University, Rubi Laboratories, and the vHive Animal Health Incubator.
Under the Phase II program, Caravel plans to extend the platform to additional enzyme classes and advance pilot projects across applications including DNA writing, carbon capture, and rare earth separation.
Jastrzębski previously worked at Intel, GitHub, bytewax, Proxima, and Ginkgo Bioworks.
KEY QUOTES:
“When an experiment costs a fraction of a cent instead of tens of dollars, you stop asking which handful of ideas might work and instead start testing all of them.”
Emily Bowman, PhD., Chief Scientific Officer Of Caravel Bio
“I’ve seen firsthand how much AI in biology is still held back by a lack of the right data, not a lack of ambition. Caravel is solving that problem at the source.”
Michał Jastrzębski, CTO Of Caravel Bio
