Tufts to launch innovation hub for lab-grown foods

Tufts University announced Thursday it will use a $2.1 million state grant to create an innovation hub for lab-grown foods. The new center will open in 2026 on the school's Medford campus.

Scientists, food policymakers and entrepreneurs will collaborate on the project to bring “future foods” — like meat cultivated in the lab — to market, the school said.

Industrial meat production has been linked to the rise of multiple ecological and public health concerns, including antibiotic resistance, deforestation and climate change. Proponents of so-called “cellular agriculture” say the technology could offer alternative proteins to meet the rising global demand for meat.

“There are really only two things anybody's looking at that would change the upward trajectory,” Bruce Friedrich of the Good Food Institute, a think tank dedicated to alternative proteins, said at a Tufts conference last week. “One of them is, convince people to eat less meat. The other is this: make meat differently and better.”

Tufts’ food innovation hub will include lab equipment, a test kitchen and a cell bank that will provide open access to cultured cells, according to the university.

“We're really thrilled that we're establishing the first commercialization hub here at Tufts,” said Provost Caroline Genco.

The nascent alternative-protein industry, which includes both plant-based and lab-grown meat, has been struggling to gain traction in the U.S. Lab-grown meat has faced pushback from consumers and farmers, and has been banned in several states, including Florida and Alabama.

Massachusetts, however, is leaning in.

“ We want Massachusetts to be the undeniable leader in this sector,” said Lily Fitzgerald, director for the Center for Advanced Manufacturing at MassTech, the public agency that funded Tufts’ innovation hub.

Research from the Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture has already led to five biotech startups, according to a university spokesperson. One is Deco Labs, which developed a plant-based product to feed cultured cells, an essential step to creating marketable lab-grown meat products.