Food Science
Proteins4Singapore
Developing sustainable alternative protein solutions to strengthen Singapore’s food security.
About the Programme
Proteins4Singapore develops sustainable protein ingredients and foods for land and resource constrained urban environments. The programme integrates urban-compatible biomass production with sustainable extraction and processing, analytical characterisation, texturisation and reverse food engineering, nutrition and microbiome research, food safety, and supply-chain assessment.
Proteins4Singapore connects protein production and processing with functionality, nutrition, sensory quality and scale-up to develop practical and appealing alternative-protein foods for Singapore.
Key Objectives
Combining the functionality-driven cultivation of alternative non-animal protein sources with innovative processing and extraction methods as well as novel reverse food engineering approaches, the following research objectives are defined:
- Develop synergies between cultivation of indoor soybean and microalgal biomass within optimised space and minimal resource inputs.
- Urban Protein Production: Develop resource-efficient microalgae and other protein production systems suited to urban environments.
- Link efficient and sustainable extraction methods for these protein sources to the techno-functional, nutritive and flavour aspects of food production.
- Enable an analytical characterization platform for functionality-driven optimisations of protein cultivation and processing, and establish knowledge for functionalisation of these proteins and peptides by thermomechanical processing and bioengineering techniques.
- Create novel and efficient food production concepts by reverse engineering approaches for large-scale industrial or decentralised food production platforms.
- Rational Texturisation: Develop food structures through reverse engineering approaches that utilise the molecular properties and interactions of food components.
- Specify functional aspects and identify the mechanisms of beneficial food-microbe interactions and their advantages for consumers in Singapore.
- Develop a resilient local supply chain of protein-based agri-food products and assess the protein supply chains for the proposed production technologies with tools such as life-cycle assessment and techno-economic assessment.
- Additive Manufacturing: Enable rapid, iterative food design and scalable industrial or decentralised production through additive manufacturing.
Programme Details
Status: Active
Domain: Food
Partners: TUM, NTU, SIFBI, SIT
Research Team
Proteins4Singapore is delivered by a consortium of investigators from TUM, NTU, SIFBI and SIT, together with a resident research team based at TUMCREATE in Singapore.
Technical University of Munich (TUM)
- BECKER, Thomas — Programme Lead
- GULDIN, Stefan — Principal Investigator
- ASSENG, Senthold — Principal Investigator
- BRUECK, Thomas — Principal Investigator
- DAWID, Corinna — Principal Investigator
- HALLER, Dirk — Co-Investigator
- HINRICHSEN, Kai-Olaf — Principal Investigator
- RYCHLIK, Michael — Principal Investigator
Nanyang Technological University (NTU)
- PREISER, Peter — Programme Lead
- CHAN Bee Eng Mary — Co-Investigator
- CHEN, Wei Ning William — Principal Investigator
- JUDEH, Zaher — Co-Investigator
- LAU, Raymond — Principal Investigator
- LI King Ho Holden — Co-Investigator
- TAN Lay Poh — Co-Investigator
- S. Viswanathan — Principal Investigator
- WANG Yulan — Principal Investigator
- YEONG Wai Yee — Principal Investigator
Singapore Institute of Food and Biotechnology Innovation (SIFBI)
- NG Siew Bee — Co-Investigator
- KANAGASUNDARAM, Yoganathan — Co-Investigator
Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT)
- NELSON, Arif — Co-Investigator
- LIM Bee Gim — Co-Investigator
Researchers at TUMCREATE
- Prof. Stefan Guldin — Scientific Co-Director and Resident Principal Investigator
- Leonard Ng Wei Tat (Asst Prof) — Principal Investigator
- Kelin Xia (Assoc Prof) — Principal Investigator
- Diego Atoche Garay — Research Associate
- LUO Jing (Yvonne) — Research Associate
- Marta Arbrile — Research Associate
- Nadyssa Willanda — Research Associate
- Dr Nikolaus Isidor Stellner — Research Fellow
- Tillmann Maria Peest — Research Associate
- Dr Vanesa Calvo Baltanas — Research Fellow
- Dr Vishal Khanpit — Research Fellow
- Dr Oliver Watkins — Analytical Food Chemist (Metabolomics)
- Dr Shiwei Ng — Research Fellow
- Rishika Batra — Research Associate
- Sophia Morsten — Research Associate
- Jooseop Park — Research Associate
- Weichen Shu — Research Associate
- Dr Nathaniel Hendrik — Research Fellow
- Natan Abelian — Research Associate
- Helena Heimes — Research Fellow
- Junxiang Lu — Research Engineer