CellWalk Press Kit
CellWalk 3.1 · On the App Store now
Announcing CellWalk™ for iPhone Duo
Walk inside a living cell. CellWalk, by Ako Biotica, lets you explore real cells built from scientific data, from the whole cell down to the atoms in DNA, with Ako, an AI tutor that sees what you see and talks back. On iPhone Duo, every atom is drawn live at full detail, the large inner display surrounds you with the cell, and the layout suits however you hold it.
Download press kitView on the App Store
Every image at full size, plus all of this page’s text as Markdown. One .zip, 56.9 MB.
Fact sheet
- App
- CellWalk™ 3.1, ready for iPhone Duo
- Developer
- Ako Biotica Inc., Canada
- Founders
- Timothy Davison, Co-founder & CEO
Hamed Kaddoura, Co-founder & CFO - Platforms
- iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro, optimized for iPhone Duo.
- Price
- Free to start. Pro is included for your first 14 days, with no sign-up and no card. CellWalk Pro is US$9.99 a month or US$79.99 a year (CA$12.99 or CA$99.99).
- Age
- For people aged 13 and over
- Recognition
- 2025 Apple Design Awards finalist, Visuals and Graphics. From Apple’s citation: “CellWalk is a biology class like none other.”
- App Store
- apps.apple.com/app/cellwalk/id1627776848
- Website
- cellwalk.ca
- Press contact
- press@akobiotica.com
Designed for every posture.
CellWalk lays itself out for the way you hold iPhone Duo: the cover display held tall, the large inner display held wide, or partially open on your desk.
Cover display, held tall
Closed
A phone in your pocket. The scene sits above the tour card, ready for a quick question on the go.
Inner display, wide open
Open
The large inner display is fully immersive. The cell fills the screen while Ako narrates, or the scene takes one half and the tour card the other.
Partially open
Seated and standing
Set it seated on your desk and let Ako take you on a tour of the cell: the scene sits up top, with Ako’s captions and large controls below. Stand it up and the scene fills the cover display, with the controls beside it.
Why iPhone Duo.
A cell, an AI tutor and a voice, all running at once on one phone.
A20 Pro
Performance without compromise
CellWalk draws billions of atoms live on iPhone Duo, at full detail and full frame rate, even with Ako, our AI tutor, running alongside it. It isn’t a video, so you can go anywhere.
Inner display
A large screen that immerses you
Open iPhone Duo and the cell fills the large inner display, surrounding you with the molecular machines that keep it alive.
Postures
Learning that suits the moment
Closed, CellWalk is a phone in your pocket, ready for a quick question. Set it seated on your desk and let Ako take you on a tour of the cell. Open it wide to explore on your own.
Ako, the AI tutor
Apple Intelligence brings CellWalk to life
Apple Intelligence powers Ako, our tutor that helps you learn biology. Ako sees what you see, takes you on narrated tours and answers your questions, as simply or as deeply as you like. On-device Foundation Models, Core AI and Private Cloud Compute keep your data private, and your voice never leaves your device.
In Tim’s words.
Tim Davison, co-founder and CEO of Ako Biotica, from his iPhone Duo demo.
“Do you remember learning about the cell in science class? It was kind of like blobs inside of blobs. For me, it wasn’t until years later, when I read David Goodsell’s The Machinery of Life, that all of the pieces finally started to fit together. That moment led to CellWalk.”
“The ribosome is literally a 3D printer for making other molecular machines. At this tiny scale, there are machines like this. Isn’t that crazy?”
“iPhone Duo and the A20 Pro are pretty amazing for games. I think they might be even more amazing for science and education. We render billions of atoms at full detail and full frame rate, without compromise, even with everything else going on, like our AI tutor powered by Apple Intelligence.”
“A professor in Germany showed CellWalk to his kids. He told me they won’t think about biology the way we did, as blobs inside of blobs. They’ll build their scientific journey on top of CellWalk’s visuals. That’s pretty exciting for the future of education and science.”
Pricing
Free to start. Pro is included for your first 14 days. No sign-up, no card.
| Plan | United States | Canada |
|---|---|---|
| CellWalkThe whole cell, the first tour and its Ako lesson, the hands-on What is a Protein? lesson, and Ako with a daily allowance | Free | Free |
| CellWalk Pro, monthlyEvery guided tour and its Ako lesson, with a larger daily allowance and longer answers from Ako | US$9.99 | CA$12.99 |
| CellWalk Pro, annualEverything in monthly, billed once a year | US$79.99 | CA$99.99 |
One subscription covers iPhone, iPad and Mac. Subscribe inside the app, any time, including during the first 14 days.
Prices vary by country, and the App Store shows the local price.
Images
Real CellWalk screens on iPhone Duo, in Apple’s iPhone Duo device artwork. Tap any image to open the full-size file in a new tab, then save it. Each one has a transparent background. Or download them all in one .zip with the page’s text as Markdown.
The device artwork belongs to Apple and is licensed to us only for showing our app on Apple devices. Use these images only to show CellWalk, and don’t cut out or alter the device.
Open
Inner display, held wide · PNG, 3093 × 2247 px
Closed
Cover display, held tall · PNG, 1574 × 2194 px
Seated and standing
Partially open · PNG, transparent background
App icon and award
PNG
About Ako Biotica
Ako Biotica Inc. is a spatial science learning company in Canada: two people building CellWalk so anyone can walk inside a living cell.
Its own rendering engine draws billions of atoms in real time on the iPhone, iPad and Mac you already own, and its own authoring tools turn those datasets into the tours and lessons in CellWalk.
Ako is pronounced AH-koh, Māori for “to teach and learn together.”
Timothy Davison
Co-founder & CEO
CellWalk began after Tim’s PhD, out of rendering work that made billion-atom cell models run on the devices students already carry. He builds the app and does the science.
Hamed Kaddoura
Co-founder & CFO
Hamed brings CellWalk to the people who use it, from students to classrooms and schools, and grows the business around it.
A real cell, protein by protein, down to the atom.
CellWalk’s bacterial cell is the published whole-cell model of Mycoplasma genitalium by Martina Maritan, Ludovic Autin, Jonathan Karr, Markus Covert, Arthur Olson and David Goodsell at Scripps Research, rendered at its actual coordinates (Maritan et al., 2022). Its tour, The Molecular Design of Life, was written by Dr. David Goodsell.
The bacterial cell is one of many scenes in CellWalk, which also explores other cells and molecular machines, including models built by Ako Biotica.
Contact
Interviews, questions and review access. One of us answers.
X @CellWalkApp YouTube @CellWalkApp Instagram @cellwalk cellwalk.ca akobiotica.com App Store