A new centre at Imperial College will address the critical global problem of our current unsustainable and environmentally damaging food ecosystems.
Opening today, Imperial College’s Bezos Centre for Sustainable Protein will develop innovative and evidence-based solutions by developing, delivering and commercialising alternative food products that are economical, environmentally friendly, nutritious, affordable and delicious.
The centre, which spans seven academic departments at Imperial College, will advance research in precision fermentation, cultured meat, bioprocessing and automation, nutrition, and artificial intelligence and machine learning.
This work will help ensure that there are more protein options in the future – and that they taste good, are nutritious and inexpensive. Dr Andrew Steer President and CEO of the Bezos Earth Fund
The Bezos Earth Fund is providing the funding as part of a $100 million commitment to develop sustainable protein alternatives and expand consumer choice, and an overall $1 billion commitment to transform food production. It is one of several Earth Fund Centres working with other institutions and industry partners to develop and commercialise new alternative protein products to give consumers more choice in meat and dairy products.
Professor Hugh Brady, President of Imperial College London, said: “Food security is one of the greatest challenges facing humanity. For a sustainable future, we must ensure that people around the world can have sufficient and nutritious food, with minimal impact on biodiversity, the climate and our wider natural environment.
“Imperial has cutting-edge research, innovation, partnerships and the power to advance the world’s food systems, and we are very excited about the potential of our new Bezos Centre for Sustainable Protein.”
Dr Andrew Steer, President and CEO of the Earth Fund, said: “The Bezos Earth Fund is proud to support Imperial as the site of our second Sustainable Protein Centre. By 2050, the world’s population will be over 10 billion people, so now is the time to rethink the way we produce and consume food. This work will help ensure our future includes more protein options – and that they taste good, are nutritious and cost-effective.”
Watch the launch event below:
Transformation of our food system
Protein is essential for human health. Without protein, our cells, tissues and organs cannot function. We get proteins from our diet, which includes both animal and plant sources, such as meat, eggs, fish, nuts and legumes such as beans.
However, animal protein production requires enormous land use and generates significant greenhouse gas emissions. As the world’s population grows, human and planetary health will increasingly depend on the widespread availability of proteins that taste good and are produced in ways that reduce emissions and protect nature.
Plant-based proteins are already gaining popularity as meat alternatives, for example in pea protein-based burgers. In addition, new technologies are being used to produce new types of proteins that also have the potential to serve this purpose. These include microbial fermentation, which can produce proteins and nutrients for food recipes, as well as cultured meat from animal cells.
The widespread acceptance and use of these alternative proteins depends on improving their quality and price, as well as reducing costs and energy consumption. To transform these proteins into healthy and tasty foods, other components must also be produced more sustainably and efficiently, such as healthy fats and carbohydrates, as well as aspects such as taste, aroma, coloring and vitamins. This is where engineering biology comes into play.
Accelerated development
Engineering biology applies engineering concepts to design, build, and manufacture cells and products. The center will use a combination of rational and computational engineering strategies with automation in biofoundries – where cells are transformed into mini-factories that produce useful products – to accelerate the development and scaling of new bio-based processes.
The center’s ethos is that bioengineered solutions can – and should – be positive for both the planet and people. Dr Rodrigo Ledesma-Amaro Head of the Center
It will also include institutes and facilities to help translate discoveries into practical applications, train the next generation of bioengineers and support commercialisation. These include the Centre for Synthetic Biology, established in 2009 as the first of its kind in Europe; SynbiCITE, the UK’s industrial translation centre for synthetic biology; and the Centre for Translational Nutrition & Food Research, which has partnerships with Quorn, Nestlé, Unilever and Waitrose, among others.
The director of the new centre, Dr Rodrigo Ledesma-Amaro of the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College, said: “The ethos of the centre is that bioengineered solutions can – and should – be positive for both the planet and people. Imperial is uniquely positioned to harness the potential of biotechnology to accelerate the alternative protein revolution and transform global food systems.”
Dr Andy Jarvis, Director of the Future of Food at the Earth Fund, said: “Later is dangerously late when thinking about expanding our world’s protein sources. Imperial College London has pioneered the field of biological engineering and is therefore well placed to develop sustainable protein options that will satisfy the growing global mass.”
International partners
The centre will be headquartered at Imperial, with three offices in the UK and three overseas, and more than 65 international partners ranging from cutting-edge research and innovation to the commercialisation of new products.
The UK speakers are grouped among members of the Cellular Agriculture Manufacturing Hub at UCL and Aberystwyth University, the Food Centre at Reading University and the Growing Kent & Medway consortium, which includes the National Institute of Agricultural Botany and the Universities of Kent and Greenwich.
Hosts for international lectures are the Technical University of Denmark (Biosustain), Tufts University (Centre for Cellular Agriculture) and the National University of Singapore.
The opening of the Bezos Centre for Sustainable Protein at Imperial College follows the announcement of a sister centre at North Carolina State University last month. The centre is part of the Bezos Earth Fund’s commitment to support the transformation of food and agricultural systems, which includes efforts to reduce emissions from livestock farming.