Future crop development may incorporate new technologies like high-throughput screening. 

It is impossible to accurately predict and control severe weather events like drought or flooding that can have a range of deleterious effects on crop yield and quality. Incorporating indoor ag and vertical farming technologies to help more tightly control growing conditions may improve the consistency of raw materials used for plant-based meat. However, it is unclear whether the types and amounts of crops needed for plant-based meat can be vertically farmed economically.

Another area of opportunity is to adapt high-throughput screening methods and equipment to measure functional properties. In order to assess functional properties of hundreds or thousands of unexplored protein sources and to capture which properties are altered through variations in growing conditions and geographies, these high-throughput and systematic methods need to be readily accessible.

For assays that cannot readily be scaled down for high-throughput use, it may be possible to use computational or machine learning approaches to correlate easily-accessible parameters with performance in more complex assays. 

Check out additional reading and resources

Discover seminars, GFI resources, ongoing research projects, and research opportunities related to crop development.

The science of plant-based meat (2021) | GFI

Regards Mark