# BioFuse

**R-2A activity** of project WP-01 — BIOLOGICALLY BASED MATERIALS AND DEVICES  
**Program element:** 0602024E — Warfighting Performance  
**Component:** Defense-Wide · **Budget Activity:** 2  
**Vintage:** President's Budget PB2027  
**Canonical URL:** https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01/a7  
**Parent:** https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01

## Summary

This activity requests $33.6M in FY2027, 23% of project WP-01, up 438% on FY2026. The R-2A exhibit describes it across FY2026–FY2027, including what the FY2027 money is planned to buy.

## What the FY2027 request buys

**FY2027 planned work.** - Demonstrate model-driven, rational design of biological candidates and increase strength and selectivity of metal/mineral interactions. - Evaluate top biological metal/mineral processing candidates under real-world processing workflows and conditions. - Perform process durability assessments. - Refine the list of candidate biological targets. - Produce a high purity metal/mineral product from a real-world feedstock. - Produce a high purity metal/mineral product from a traditionally uneconomical waste feedstock. - Demonstrate potential for technological scale-up using real world feedstocks. - Initiate a techno-economic analysis to validate the commercial viability and industrial potential of the technology. - Assess the potential for adapting the developed bioprocessing platforms to process other metals and minerals of strategic importance to national security.

**FY2026 to FY2027 change.** The FY 2027 increase reflects a shift from proof-of-concept demonstrations and model development to engineering biologics for industrial processing of real-world feedstocks at scale.

## Before the request year

**FY2026 plans — current year.** - Identify candidate biological targets that demonstrate highly selective metal interactions or properties that may be engineered to induce highly selective metal interactions. - Baseline the ability of biological candidates to successfully produce a metal or mineral product from simulated feedstocks. - Explore model-driven workflows for rapid design-build-test cycles of biological candidates.

## Funding

| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2026 | Enacted | 6.3 |
| FY2027 | Request | 33.6 |

> Prior, current and budget year only — an R-2A activity carries no five-year plan. It sums exactly into its project in the request year and not necessarily in any other.

## Other activities in project WP-01

- [Biologically Based Materials and Devices Studies and Concepts](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01/a9) — FY2027 30.1
- [Genetic Utilization for Advanced Regulation and Defense of Indigenous And Native Species (GUARDIAN)](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01/a6) — FY2027 25.3
- [Fleetwood](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01/a8) — FY2027 20.0
- [eX Virentia (eXVi)](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01/a1) — FY2027 12.8
- [Turning Upcycled Waste into Novel, Sustainable Materials](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0602024E/WP-01/a0) — FY2027 11.7
- Biological Undersea Energy — FY2027 5.4
- Biotechnology for Challenging Environments — FY2027 5.0
- Field Forward Biothreat Storage Solutions for Force Protection — FY2027 2.5
- Strengthening Resilient Emotions and Nimble Cognition Through Engineering Neuroplasticity (STRENGTHEN) — FY2027 0.6
- Materiel Protection through Biologics — FY2027 —
- Environmental Microbes as a Bioengineering Resource (EMBER) — FY2027 —

## Source & machine access

- **Source:** FY2027 Office of the Secretary of Defense RDT&E Budget Justification, Exhibit R-2A, PE 0602024E project WP-01 (PB PB2027). Narrative is the government's own text.
- **No marks, no contractors at this grain** — congressional marks land on the program element and R-3 performers on the project.
- **MCP:** `mcp.hitchintel.com` — `budget_get_activity`.

*HitchAI is an independent intelligence service, not affiliated with the U.S. Department of Defense. Budget figures are requests/estimates, not obligations.*