Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA)

?? Big news!!!! We're growing quickly and are looking for FIVE new full-time, dedicated cellular agriculture and future food faculty members to join TUCCA. In under eight years, cell ag at Tufts has gone from being a fringe project to a concerted effort of 90+ people from the undergraduate to faculty level working on cultivated meat. Now, we're looking to expand our expertise and ability to support the field. We’re especially interested in applicants with backgrounds in sensory, nutritional, and techno-economic analysis in the context of sustainability, cell engineering, bioprocess engineering, artificial intelligence, and tissue systems related to experimental or computational approaches. Learn more and apply: https://lnkd.in/gzhsHREC #cellularagriculture #cellag #cultivatedmeat #futureoffood

Great article by Arielle Samuelson published in HEATED on how AI can contribute to the acceleration of cell-cultivated meat development. My comment, as a member of Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA) has been included on the importance of this issue. Take a read!

David Kaplan, professor of biomedical engineering & executive director of Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA), appeared on Boston’s NPR news station WBUR to discuss cultivated meat R&D ?? https://wbur.fm/3Ohpg3t Kaplan, who was recently named one of the world’s most highly cited researchers according to Clarivate, highlighted the crucial role public funding from the state of Massachusetts has played in driving scientific progress in the field. "Being in Massachusetts is critical for this technology. We have all the life sciences, we have all the pharma industries here. So building this next wave of Massachusetts-led innovation in food is going to be something brand new. That's why the support from the state has been really important as well," says Kaplan. Earlier this year, TUCCA received a $2.1 million grant to establish a cellular agriculture innovation center aimed at closing the gap between innovation and commercialization of #cultivatedmeat and other cellular agriculture products.

It was such an honor to attend and present our research using insect cells as an ingredient for cultivated meat at The International Scientific Conference on Cultured Meat (ISCCM)! Really enjoyed seeing all the fascinating presentations and posters, and looking forward to continuing to learn from this community. If you want to learn more about this research, our recent preprint is here: https://lnkd.in/eq3Sv7bv ??

And that's a wrap on the 10 year anniversary edition of The International Scientific Conference on Cultured Meat (ISCCM) ???? Looking forward to seeing everyone again next year :) #culturedmeat #cultivatedmeat #cellularagriculture #thevalley #cellag

Last up for the day is Sophia Letcher with her presentation titled ‘Bug Appétit: Establishment & Characterization of a Non-Adherent Insect Cell Line for Cultivated Meat.’ ?? Sophie is a 5th year PhD student working with Dr. David Kaplan, focusing on insect cell line development and exploration for cultivated meat purposes. In her presentation, Sophie wonderfully summed up one of the most exciting aspects of cultivated meat: the opportunity to explore novel & unconventional protein sources. Traditional livestock species (e.g. cows, chickens, and pigs) are largely the main focus of the meat industry as they have come to best suit the constraints of conventional farming practices. Cultivated meat, however, frees us from some of these limitations. By broadening our perspective to include species like insects, we could discover cells that are naturally well-suited to the unique requirements of cultivated meat production. The International Scientific Conference on Cultured Meat (ISCCM) #ISCCM10

Next up is Michael Saad with his presentation ‘Surf for Turf: Goldfish FGF Improves Bovine Cell Proliferation in Serum-Free Media’. ?? Michael is a 5th year PhD student at TUCCA in Dr. David Kaplan’s lab. Most of his prior research has involved fish cell line development, but this presentation highlights some very curious & unexpected findings regarding the impact of goldfish FGF on bovine cell growth. He goes into a molecular deep dive into why this may be the case, motivating the investigation of other FGF orthologs to further improve bovine cell growth in Beefy-9 media. The International Scientific Conference on Cultured Meat (ISCCM) #ISCCM10

Session 3—Materials & Media for Tissue Generation! ? “The Whey Forward: Nutrient-Rich Substrates for Meat Production” by Rachael Floreani from University of Vermont ?? “Development of Serum-Free Growth Media Using Automation and Bayesian Optimization” by Anirvan Guha from Multus ?? “Optimized Bovine Myogenesis In Vitro Through Modulation of Signaling Pathways for Cultivated Meat Applications” by @Christine Troutmann from ETH Zürich ?? “Surf for Turf: Goldfish FGF Improves Bovine Cell Proliferation in Serum-Free Media” by Michael Saad from Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA)

Session 2: Advanced Bioprocessing Technologies! 1. “Sacred Cows and Cellular Agriculture” by Jonas Elliott Gerson from PnuVax Incorporated 2. “NMR and vibrational spectroscopy as tools for spent media analysis of metabolites during cultured meat production” by Sissel Beate R?nning from Nofima 3. “From Cell to Tissue Processing—Enabling Cultivated Meat Production at Scale” by Barak Zohar from Ever After Foods 4. “Sodium Zirconium Phoephate as Adsorbent Material for Ammonium Removal in Animal Cell Culture” by Ning Xiang from University of Alberta 5. “Metabolic modeling and metabolobics guided chicken cell media optimization” by Pomai Yamaguchi from Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA)

Our first TUCCA presentation is by Pomai Yamaguchi on ‘Metabolic modeling and metabolomics guided chicken cell media optimization’. Pomai is a PhD student within the Department of Chemical Engineering at Tufts working with Dr. Kyongbum Lee. She is focusing on the usage of computational tools to better understand cell metabolism, which can then be used to inform improvements regarding media formulations. Cell culture media is a major cost driver in cultivated meat production, making media optimization a critical & impactful focus in the effort to achieve price parity between conventional and cultivated meat products. The International Scientific Conference on Cultured Meat (ISCCM) #ISCCM10