Probiota Pioneer: Kioga on reclaiming ‘Old Friends’ for balanced state

Established in 2025, the startup brings together a team with expertise spanning psychoneuroimmunology, soil science, human microbiome biotechnology and commercialization. Its work is rooted in extensive clinical research conducted by Professor company co-founder Christopher Lowry at the University of Colorado Boulder, showing how soil-derived microbes can target neuroinflammation, a root cause of mental health and metabolic challenges as what Kioga has positioned as a “stress vaccine”.

Ahead of his Probiota Pioneers presentation at the upcoming Probiota Americas in Vancouver, Justin Whiteley, CEO and co-founder at Kioga, discusses the founding and growth of Kioga and the company’s conviction that the next wave of nutrition innovation will come from a deeper understanding how the immune system shapes human health, particularly brain health.

NI: What was the driving force behind the founding of Kioga?

JW: Kioga was founded around a simple but powerful observation: Many of the most widespread modern health challenges— stress, mood disorders, metabolic dysfunction— share chronic, low-grade inflammation as a common biological thread.

At the same time, decades of research point to something we’ve lost. Humans evolved in constant contact with environmental microbes that trained the immune system to maintain a balanced state. As that exposure disappeared, increased rates of inflammatory and stress-related conditions arose. We started Kioga to bring back those missing signals by building a new ingredient category we call “Old Friends.”

NI: What has gone into scaling the business to create real innovation?

JW: Translating an academic field into a commercial ingredient category requires building in a different order than most startups. On the R&D side, we built a proprietary discovery platform focused on soil-derived microbes with immunoregulatory potential. That includes strain isolation, screening for anti-inflammatory signaling and preclinical validation.

In parallel, early on we invested heavily in manufacturing and formulation, ensuring our ingredients are stable, scalable and usable across various formats from day one. We’ve also been intentional about partnerships, working with leading brands, research groups and clinical collaborators to validate both the science and the commercial opportunity.

As a company, we’ve been able to move our first ingredient to market on less than $1 million in equity financing. It is a testament to the experience and scrappiness of our team.

NI: How was your library of soil-derived microbes developed and why isolate from soil?

Soil is one of the richest and most underexplored sources of microbial diversity on the planet. One gram of soil can contain more diversity of bacteria species than the entire human gut. It’s also where many of the organisms central to the “Old Friends” hypothesis were originally identified.

These microbes didn’t evolve to live in the gut, they evolved in the environment alongside humans, constantly interacting with the immune system. That natural history makes them particularly well-suited for influencing immune regulation.

Our library, developed with collaboration through the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, involves targeted environmental sampling and screening, with a focus on identifying strains and bioactives that are safe and can produce potent immunoregulatory signals— particularly those that promote pathways relevant to brain health.

NI: How was NeuroAlly identified/isolated for commercialization, and how does it target neuroinflammation at source? What is the next soil-derived postbiotic in the pipeline?

NeuroAlly (KGA-10 strain) emerged from our microbial discovery platform which integrates large-scale genomic, metabolomic, physiological and in vitro immune-cell datasets to predict functionality before advancing candidates into preclinical validation. NeuroAlly consistently demonstrated a distinctive profile across these datasets, including the production of novel bioactive compounds associated with immune regulation and brain health.

Mechanistically, NeuroAlly works through the gut-immune–brain axis. It helps recalibrate immune signaling, which in turn influences microglia—the primary immune cells in the brain. By reducing microglial priming in the emotional regulation circuits of the brain, we’ve documented measurable restoration toward a homeostatic stress response.

In parallel, we’re developing additional ingredients from our platform targeting metabolic health and other inflammation-sensitive systems like those related to healthy aging, cognition and healthspan.

NI: What science backs NeuroAlly and other postbiotics in the pipeline? New studies underway?

The scientific foundation of NeuroAlly was built over two decades of multidisciplinary research in psychoneuroimmunology, particularly work linking environmental microbes to immune regulation and stress resilience from Professor Christopher Lowry at the University of Colorado Boulder.

At Kioga, we’ve extended this into strain-specific preclinical validation and finally successfully translated the in vitroand in vivo findings in a randomized, placebo-controlled human study demonstrating improvements in perceived stress, inflammatory biomarkers and overall well-being.

We have additional studies underway with external collaborators to further explore new endpoints, novel biomarkers and state-of-the-art wearables for broader applications across health domains.

NI: What are some of the greatest challenges and successes that you have encountered in the first years of the business?

The biggest challenge has been category creation. We’re introducing a new way of thinking about health that sits between immunology, neuroscience and nutrition. That requires educating partners, alignment of messaging and building trust in something that is disrupting a well-established category like probiotics or adaptogens. At the same time, that’s also been incredibly rewarding and one of our biggest successes.

The flip side is that the same challenge has become our biggest proof point. We’re seeing strong resonance at the individual and industry levels. In individual conversations, you can almost hear a click or see a light turn on with people, and the excitement becomes palpable. And these grass-roots conversations translate to industry excitement from brand partners, from the scientific community and from global platforms like Probiota—which suggests the Old Friends category has real momentum and a story that resonates.

NI: As one of our pioneers, could you outline your approach or ethos in treading a path or direction that no other firm has gone before? How do you weigh the risks and benefits here?

We’ve approached building Kioga with a balance of conviction and discipline. The conviction comes from believing that immune regulation and balance, particularly at the level of the brain, is one of the most important frontiers in nutrition and longevity. The science around neuroinflammation, microglia and the immune–brain axis has matured significantly over the last decade, but very little of it has been translated into scalable ingredients.

The discipline has been in how we’ve chosen to build the company from day one. From the beginning, we’ve invested in clinical validation, manufacturing scale-up and formulation readiness because we believe this category will ultimately be built on our credibility, the strength of our evidence and ability to execute—not just storytelling. That includes building an internal team with deep expertise in clinical research and translational science, while also ensuring our ingredients can meet the practical demands of commercial partners.

We’ve also focused heavily on unit economics and scalability early, demonstrating that these technologies can be both scientifically differentiated and commercially viable. When you’re creating a new category, there’s always risk in being too early, but there’s also an opportunity to help define where the industry goes next.

NI: In the biotics and microbiome space, what would you say is the next research area that the industry needs to keep its eye on?

We think the field is moving beyond the gut and viable bacteria as the primary focus. The next wave will be about understanding how microbial signals influence systemic biology and how that connects to complex physiologic systems like the brain.

Concepts like the immune–brain axis, microglial regulation and neuroinflammation are still early in their commercial translation, but the underlying science is strong and growing rapidly.

NI: Finally, what is the significance for Kioga of being named one of our 2026 Probiota Pioneers, and how do you think it helps your profile in such an innovative, ever-changing industry?

Being named a Probiota Pioneer is meaningful because it reflects recognition from one of the most respected communities in the microbiome space. For us, it’s a signal that the field is ready to expand beyond traditional definitions of biotics and toward new categories grounded in immune function and systemic health. It also helps us connect with partners and researchers who are thinking about the next generation of bioactive ingredients, with Old Friends leading the way.