Indiana University of Indianapolis received a $2 million grant from the National Science Foundation to conduct research into propagation of insects for production of animal and human food.

The principal research worker will be Dr. Christine Picard, Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Education at the Indiana University School of Science.  She is the Director of the Center for Environmental Sustainability Through Insect Farming that has collaborative arrangements with Texas A&M and Mississippi State University.

The purpose of the grant will be to develop systems to culture insects to produce protein applying both biological and genetic manipulation.

Dr. Gabriel Filippelli, a participant in the project as co-principal investigator, stated, “We cannot keep producing protein to consume the way we are now, because we don’t have the resources and our planet suffers.”  He added, “We need to rethink how we survive and thrive into the future.  We foresee a world that is much more sustainable and circular with insect-based systems being a piece of it.”

The justification for the grant is questioned given that commercial insect production is a reality albeit that application is limited to animal feed.

There has been extensive investment of venture capital in insect protein with construction of large plants in the E.U., the Republic of South and, on a lesser scale, in the U.S.  The question remains as to whether this NSF grant to obviously competent scientists is a case of reinventing the wheel or whether Indiana University can engineer a breakthrough to establish financial viability for insect-derived protein that is currently in question.