Singapore · Southeast Asia

Delivering Wolbachia-based biocontrol for public health.

SymbioCI SEA works with public health agencies and government programmes across Southeast Asia to reduce vector-borne diseases, using a field-validated, non-chemical Wolbachia-based approach.

How it works

Field-validated results

The science behind our platform has been published and peer-reviewed.

SymbioCI SEA is built on more than two decades of Wolbachia research led by Prof Zhiyong Xi of Michigan State University. The results below come from peer-reviewed trials using the same strains and production methodology at the core of our platform.

Near-elimination

Of wild Ae. albopictus population across trial zones in a multi-year urban programme in Guangzhou.

Guangzhou · Nature, 2019 ↗

90.9%

Suppression of indoor female Ae. aegypti density in Merida, Mexico — the first open-field IIT-SIT trial in Latin America.

Merida, Mexico · PLOS NTD, 2022 ↗

16M

Pupae processed per week by our production partner's automated sex-sorting system, approximately 17× faster than previous methods, with ~0.5% female contamination.

Science Robotics, 2024 ↗

About SymbioCI SEA

End-to-end Wolbachia biocontrol, from production to release.

Dengue and other vector-borne diseases affect every country in Southeast Asia. Insecticide resistance is a growing constraint on existing control programmes. Wolbachia biocontrol offers a complementary route: a non-chemical, non-GMO approach with a strong peer-reviewed evidence base.

What has been missing is the production and deployment infrastructure to make this approach usable at programme scale. SymbioCI SEA exists to close that gap, bringing the strain science, the production automation, and the operational experience needed to deploy Wolbachia biocontrol within real public health programmes across the region.

About our team

Two approaches

Population suppression or replacement, or both.

The right approach depends on your programme objective and regulatory environment. SymbioCI SEA can deliver either strategy from the same integrated platform.

Diagram showing the incompatible insect technique: Wolbachia-carrying males released, mating with wild females results in eggs that do not hatch, population declines over successive cycles

Suppression · IIT

Population suppression

Male, non-biting mosquitoes carrying Wolbachia are released at scale. When they mate with wild females, the resulting eggs do not hatch, reducing the local population over successive release cycles.

Replacement · Disease blocking

Population replacement

Male and female mosquitoes carrying a disease-blocking Wolbachia strain are released. The strain spreads through the wild population over successive generations, reducing dengue transmission risk, and self-sustaining once established.

Learn more about our method

Why SymbioCI SEA

What separates our platform from others in the field

Published field results, not projections

The trials behind our platform have been published in Nature and Communications Biology. These are real-world urban results, not modelled estimates.

Production automation that makes scale viable

Our production partner's automated system processes 16 million pupae per week at ~0.5% female contamination (Science Robotics, 2024). Few operations in the world have this throughput.

Both strategies, one platform

Suppression and replacement draw from the same strain library and production infrastructure. Programmes can combine approaches without changing platforms or partners.

The strain science comes from its originator

SymbioCI SEA was co-founded by Prof Zhiyong Xi of Michigan State University, the scientist who first established stable artificial Wolbachia infections in dengue-vector mosquito species.

Scientific foundation

Founded by the researcher who opened this field.

Prof Zhiyong Xi of Michigan State University, SymbioCI SEA's co-founder, is the scientist credited with first establishing stable artificial Wolbachia infections in the Aedes mosquito species that carry dengue. His laboratory's two decades of work underpins our strain library, production methodology, and programme design approach.

About Prof Xi and our team

Prof Xi's four firsts

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First stable artificial Wolbachia infection in Ae. aegypti Science, 2005
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First stable artificial Wolbachia infection in Ae. albopictus Insect Biochem. Mol. Biol., 2005
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First stable artificial Wolbachia infection in Anopheles stephensi Science, 2013
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First stable artificial Wolbachia infection in Nilaparvata lugens Current Biology, 2020

Beyond public health

Wolbachia for agricultural pest control

Protecting crops from virus-transmitting insects.

Explore →

Get in touch

Ready to discuss your programme?

We work with ministries of health, national vector control agencies, and institutional partners to assess feasibility and design programmes suited to their context.

For agencies