Earth is the only planet with craft beer – so let’s protect it! 

Beer is a luxury, and with growing focus on sustainability, we are plagued with the question: How can we produce and enjoy beer more responsibly? One emerging tool for brewers to add to their arsenal is the power of biotechnology. 

So what exactly is biotech and how can it be applied to make beer more sustainable? Are these applications accessible for small breweries? Are they safe for consumers? And how far is “too far”?

Join us for an honest panel conversation with leading experts pioneering biotech advancements across beer’s value chain and get a taste of the innovations that undoubtedly have the potential to transform our industry. Together we will unpack the cultural and economic implications for both brewers and consumers alike — to discover where biotech is already making meaningful impact to beer’s environmental footprint. 

Alexa Katz (moderator) is a management consultant with nearly a decade of experience serving clients at the intersection of operations, strategy, and analytics. She has worked with a diverse range of organizations, from early-stage startups to Fortune 50 companies, helping them unlock growth and drive operational efficiency. Alexa has been a part of the Beer Culture Center family since 2018. While living in Chicago, Boston, and most recently New York, she has enjoyed organizing programs that bring together diverse perspectives to build community and explore the rich history, culture, and science of beer. Alexa holds a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics and Supply Chain Management from Washington University in St. Louis, and recently earned her MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management, where she focused on sustainability and innovation, particularly in the Food/Agriculture and Beer industries.

Charles Denby is a scientist by training and now technologist at Berkeley Yeast. Working under UC Berkeley professor and metabolic engineering pioneer Dr. Jay Keasling, Charles’s early scientific career involved bioengineering yeast to produce next-gen biofuels (i.e., clean diesel). His career path, however, would be redrawn by a hobby. While exploring home brewing as a way to engage his passion for beer, Charles saw how the same technology he was using to make biofuels in the lab could be applied to the production of beer, making them more consistent, efficient, and less reliant on resource-intensive agricultural products such as hops and fruit. In 2017, he co-founded Berkeley Yeast to commercialize this technology and its transformative benefits. Today the company sells bioengineered yeast with extraordinary capabilities to hundreds of breweries across the country.

With a career spanning over 30 years, Russ Heissner commenced his professional journey in 1986 as the inaugural employee and Founding Head Brewer at The Harpoon Brewery in Boston, MA. He has since gone on to establish Barrel House Z (www.barrelhousez.net) and Zenso Labs (www.zensolabs.com).  Russ excels in spearheading new ventures within the craft beer, biofuels, and precision fermentation technology sectors, consistently delivering exceptional results and driving growth. A seasoned leader, Russ possesses a proven track record of vision and success for innovative new technologies.

Dr. Tom Shellhammer is the Nor’Wester Professor of Fermentation Science and a Professor of Food Science in the Department of Food Science and Technology at Oregon State University where he carries out research, teaching and outreach activities focused on beer and raw materials quality with particular attention paid to hops. Over the past 23 years at OSU, he has investigated agronomic, on-farm, and brewery processing influences to hops and beer quality. He has published over 130 peer-reviewed and technical publications and delivered over 300 professional presentations on 5 different continents. During the 2008-2009 academic year he conducted research as an Alexander von Humboldt Senior Research Scholar at the Technical University of Berlin. Dr. Shellhammer is a former President of the American Society of Brewing Chemists, former President of the District NW Master Brewers Association of the Americas, and a Fellow of the Institute of Food Technologists and the Institute of Brewing and Distilling.

Sneha Srikrishnan, Ph.D. has over a decade of industrial experience in engineering yeasts and filamentous fungi, with successfully delivering solutions using synthetic biology for brewing, nutrition & wellness, commodity chemicals, waste valorization and environmental remediation. She worked as Senior Director, Business Development and previously as Senior Director, Strain Engineering at Ginkgo Bioworks, focused on proteins, enzymes and fungal Technology. Prior to Ginkgo, Sneha worked at Gevo, Inc. building strains for production of second generation biofuels. She holds patents and publications in food and small molecules applications, is an active member on scientific advisory boards, and is passionate about circular economies.

THIS SESSION IS GENEROUSLY SUPPORTED BY

ERIC JOHNSON + ANISSA LISTAK