Biography

Dr. Liz Specht is the Vice President of Science & Strategic Initiatives at FSI, where she leads the Sustainable Protein Action Lab — FSI’s applied innovation platform focused on accelerating scientific advancement through research prioritization, partnership development, fundraising, and milestone-driven R&D initiatives inspired by proactive, ARPA-style research management models. She also leads FSI’s Intervention Studio, an entrepreneurial platform designed to identify, test, and operationalize underexplored strategies that can strengthen the sustainable protein ecosystem.

Liz brings deep expertise at the intersection of biotechnology, biomanufacturing, food systems transformation, and strategic innovation. Her work focuses on identifying critical bottlenecks limiting the scale-up and adoption of sustainable proteins and designing high-leverage interventions capable of accelerating technological progress and real-world deployment.

Prior to joining FSI, Liz was a longtime scientific and strategic leader within the alternative protein sector, helping shape the field’s understanding of biotechnology, industrialization pathways, and commercialization challenges. She is widely recognized for her ability to translate complex scientific and technical concepts into actionable ecosystem strategy and has advised nonprofits, companies, philanthropies, investors, and policymakers on issues related to protein diversification, biomanufacturing, and food system resilience.

Liz’s work spans technical diligence, ecosystem strategy, synthetic biology, industrial biotechnology, AI-enabled R&D systems, and the intersection of food systems with resilience, national security, and bioeconomic competitiveness. She is especially passionate about building collaborative scientific infrastructure, accelerating translational research, and helping create a more robust, scalable, and resilient global protein system.