Centro de Tecnologia Canavieira (CTC), a Brazilian company focused on sugarcane variety development, has established a partnership with Ginkgo Bioworks aimed at accelerating crop protection and trait innovation. Through the partnership, CTC will utilise Ginkgo’s Plant Trait Services to discover biocontrol molecules to control sugarcane pests, which will then be tested against a microbial host system to simulate biological activity. CTC will subsequently design and develop plant traits with protection against these pests. Ginkgo Bioworks’ Plant Trait Services include trait discovery, lead protein optimisation, gene construct synthesis and design optimisation, and efficacy testing.