Isha Datar | The Art of Scientific Field-Building
Bio | Isha Datar is executive director of New Harvest, a nonprofit research institute that funds open, public cultured meat research. She has been pioneering cellular agriculture since 2009, driven by a passion to see transformative technology create a better world. In 2010, Isha published a review paper in the scientific journal Innovative Food Science and Emerging Technologies, among the first handful of papers to ever discuss cultured meat in academic literature. After co-founding Muufri (now Perfect Day Foods) and Clara Foods (now The EVERY Company) in 2014, she transferred her founding equity to New Harvest and used it to establish an endowment for cell ag research. In 2015, Isha coined the term "cellular agriculture" — officially creating a category for agriculture products produced from cell cultures rather than whole plants or animals. Isha is a Shuttleworth Foundation Fellow and Director’s Fellow at the MIT Media Lab. Isha holds a BSc. in cell and molecular biology from the University of Alberta and a master's in biotechnology from the University of Toronto.
Summary | Isha Datar coined and help popularize the term "cellular agriculture" to define an emerging future she wanted to live in. Over the past decade, her leadership has helped turn the field — the science, industry, and public image — from a distant dream to an imminent reality. We talk about the art of field-building, and why we need this type of cultural entrepreneurship more than ever.
How a class on meat science coupled with a background in cellular biology sparked her interest in the potential for cellular agriculture. pic.twitter.com/QhUhK8QDfT
— science better (@scibetter) October 25, 2021
"Rallying together people to be excited to come to a party is pretty much the same as doing a research project..." pic.twitter.com/lEMgeCsEaa
— science better (@scibetter) October 25, 2021
Standards entrepreneurship is a thankless job, but it's critical.
— science better (@scibetter) October 25, 2021
(Referencing the term from @yatesmemo's book.) pic.twitter.com/5ZbehoQSsO