FSI launches the Action Lab, alongside its open-access ‘Data Garden’ to bridge the gap between academic research and commercial alternative protein innovation.
On 30 June, 2026, Food System Innovations (FSI), the philanthropic impact platform, officially announced the launch of the Sustainable Protein Action Lab. FSI appointed Dr. Liz Specht as Vice President of Science & Strategic Initiatives to head the platform. The Functional Protein Discovery Project within the lab is led by Dr. Daniel Westcott along with scientists Vivian Jones and Iris Moore from a dedicated laboratory based in Berkeley, California.
The platform debuted with structured performance data covering 10 commercially available plant-based ingredients, including pea, soy, hemp, and fava. The program isolates plant proteins via common, commercial-level extraction routes before subjecting them to a suite of analytical tools. These tests link fundamental material properties and protein functionality directly to real-world sensory and product applications such as emulsification, gelation, foaming, and texturing.
The resulting public database is structured to serve three primary target audiences, namely Ingredient Buyers, Ingredient Suppliers, and Machine Learning Researchers. It serves as a bridge between basic academic research and venture-backed corporate commercialization. Its focus rests on in-house research, strategic partnerships, and open-source scientific resources designed to benefit the entire alternative protein field rather than locking discoveries behind proprietary corporate IP.
The Action Lab launched alongside its first major program, the Data Garden, backed by an initial $2 million USD investment. “The Data Garden was built to remove one of the biggest bottlenecks in sustainable protein innovation: the lack of comparable, trusted data,” said Dr. Westcott. It is an open-access “ingredient intelligence platform” designed to track and publish standardized performance data for alternative plant protein ingredients.
“Some of the most important challenges facing sustainable proteins fall into a gap between academia and industry,” said Dr. Specht. “The Sustainable Protein Action Lab was created to address exactly those challenges by bringing together scientific rigor, entrepreneurial execution, and a commitment to generating knowledge that benefits the entire field.”
