Headshot of Kevin McKernan

Kevin McKernan
CSO & Founder
Medicinal Genomics
SPEAKER
SAFETY & TESTING

New genomic tools in the cannabis space

We have whole genome sequenced over 1200 cannabis samples from 4 different tissue types to construct a microbiome prevalence map to better understand the frequency of various microbes in the cannabis plant. This has enabled a better understanding of Aspergillus tropism in the plant and the relative abundance of A.niger, A.terreus, A.flavus and A.fumigatus compared to other non-pathogenic Aspergillus like A.tamarii. To our surprise, A.tamarii is more prevalent than the pathogenic species the field currently tests for. This implies molecular tests that fail to exclude this common non-pathogenic species will have elevated false positives.

To enhance this microbiome survey we have collected Cannabis microbial testing data from 14 states and built a public dashboard that enables microbial fail rates to be understood state by state, lab by lab and across time to better understand seasonality and the epidemiology of microbial burden in the cannabis field.

Finally, we have implemented an Oxford Nanopore Sequencing pipeline that can sequence the entire genome of a 10 colonies in 24 hours. Bacterial genome like E.coli and Salmonella are assembled into a single circular contig with respective plasmids, Strain-typed with antibiotic resistance genes identified in 48 hours. DAM/DCM methylation patterns can be observed with Nanopore data providing an additional level of understanding of the active toxin gene expression.

These data are used to build more comprehensive qPCR assays for Fusarium and Pythium testing and recently identified mutations in the cannabis genomes that predict hermaphroditism in cannabis.

BIO

Kevin is the CSO and Founder of Medicinal Genomics and has pioneered the genomics of cannabis and hemp to build a stronger scientific environment (Kannapedia.net) for the study of cannabis based therapeutics and blockchain technologies for tracking and verifying cannabis genetics. Previously, Kevin was the CSO of Courtagen Life Sciences, Inc., and was Vice President and Director of R&D of Life Technologies where he managed the development of Life Technologies next generation SOLiD sequencing technology. Integral to the SOLiD R&D process, Kevin oversaw over 100 research collaborations exploring the new biological frontiers with next generation sequencing and saw particular excitement and traction in human tumor sequencing. Kevin initiated an R&D project to investigate chemFET semiconductor based DNA sequencing and spearheaded a process to acquire the DNA sequencing company Ion Torrent for $350M. These collaborations resulted in hundreds of publications and 7 Journal covers from Science Translational Medicine to Nature.

Kevin was the President and CSO of Agencourt Personal Genomics, a startup company he co-founded in 2005 to invent revolutionary sequencing technologies that dropped the cost of sequencing a human genome from $300M to $3,000; a 100,000-fold improvement in sequencing speed and cost in a few years. In 2000, Kevin Co-Founded Agencourt Biosciences Corporation and acted as the CSO until it was acquired by Beckman Coulter. Kevin also managed the R&D for the Human Genome Project at Whitehead Institute/MIT resulting in several patents for nucleic acid purification. Kevin holds a B.S. in Biology from Emory University with a focus on cloning and expressing Norepinephrine Transporters. When not decoding DNA and unraveling the mysteries of cannabis medicine, Kevin enjoy boating, skiing, and gardening.

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