Dr. Rui Shi

Assistant Professor

Department: Chemical Engineering
College:  Engineering
Address: 229 Chemical and Biomedical Engineering Building
Phone: 814-863-6590
E-mail: rms6987@psu.edu
Website: https://s2d2lab.notion.site

Sustainability assessment of plant-based meat and alternative protein production

Alternative protein production has been a strategic area in transforming the U.S. economy to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050. Per President Biden’s Executive Order 14081, to harness the research and development to further societal goals, one of the bold goals for U.S. Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing specified that “in 5 years, demonstrate viable pathways to produce protein for food consumption including from biomass, waste, and CO2 that achieve >50% lifecycle GHG emissions reduction and cost parity relative to current production methods.”
For this project, we aim to advance engineered Circular Food Protein Production Systems by utilizing system analyses tools to evaluate the sustainability of various protein production systems (e.g., plant-based meat with heme protein produced via fermentation, lab cultured meat, etc.) , and using the sustainability results to help prioritize research targets in engineering better plants tailored as bioeconomy feedstocks, improve usage of green biomass, and develop more efficient protein production systems.
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Scale-up economics and life cycle analyses on sustainable hydrogen production and delivery pathways

There has been numerous new investment underway with hydrogen for decarbonization. For this project will be partnering with AICHE Sustainable Energy Corps to develop core hydrogen process models to elucidate the potential costs and carbon footprints of a variety of green hydrogen production systems. Students will focus on case studies that contribute to an integrated modeling platform that leverages life cycle assessment (LCA; for environmental impacts) and life cycle cost (LCC; for financial feasibility)