Academic Challenge

BioMADE Bioindustry for Undergraduate Interdisciplinary Learning & Discovery (BUILD): Future Food

It's 2024. Do you know where your food comes from and what can be done to increase the awareness and adoption of biomanufactured food? BioMADE is launching an academic challenge to find out.

Project Focus

BioMADE is excited to host a National Academic Challenge for interdisciplinary, multi-collegiate teams and industry mentors based on the adoption and awareness of biomanufactured foods. The future food-focused theme includes: 

  • Selection and design of bioproduced macro and micronutrients

  • Feedstock optimization

  • Bioprocess design and end-product formulation

  • Manufacturing processes modeled on real-world scenarios for foodstuff production and scarcity

The Academic Challenge is designed to provide students with practical research experiences that promote creativity, critical thinking, and technical innovation, while highlighting the vital need to develop career pathways related to the emerging bioindustrial manufacturing sector. This project will:

  • Drive adoption and awareness of biomanufactured food

  • Expose a diverse group of students to career options and pathways in bioindustrial manufacturing through research and experience-based learning

  • Generate new and innovative ideas that use bioindustrial manufacturing for food production to propose, test, and evaluate strategies to solve complex real-world challenges

  • Bolster interest in expanding bioindustrial manufacturing public-private partnerships

Scenarios

The challenge will engage industry-guided, intercollegiate, and interdisciplinary undergraduate teams to propose, design, and explore solutions for biomanufactured production of foodstuffs based on the following scenarios:

  • Food scarcity in rural and urban environments

  • Bioproduced food for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief

  • Nutritional requirements for mobile troops deployed in austere conditions

  • Long duration military base or limited space environments

Teams will include a maximum of 10 students and faculty mentors assembled from one 4-year research intensive institution and at least one community and technical college and/or MSI (HBCU, TCU, HSI, AANAPISI).

Teams

Teams will include a maximum of 10 students and faculty mentors assembled from one 4-year research intensive institution and at least one community and technical college and/or MSI (HBCU, TCU, HSI, AANAPISI). Teams will submit a project proposal to be competitively reviewed. Selected teams will be eligible to receive funding support for project expenses related to the Academic Challenge.

Distribution A.  Approved for public release:  distribution unlimited. AFRL-2023-6263