As a Senior R&D Manager on the Product Innovation team at Impossible Foods, Dr. Laura Kliman leads teams that create delicious, nutritious and sustainable plant-based meats through a deep understanding of chemistry, food, and flavor science. Laura is a key member of the team that developed Impossible Pork and Sausage, and she’s also on the team that develops Impossible Foods’ next-generation prototypes.

Laura is an organic chemist by training, having received her Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Boston College and her bachelor’s degree in Chemistry with a minor in Environmental Science from Boston University. Her doctoral work focused on developing new catalysts for efficiently and selectively building versatile small molecules that could be used in medicinal chemistry.

In addition to her academic research, Laura also has a variety of publications and patents from her work in the pharmaceutical and biofuel industries. She was previously a medicinal chemist at Merck Pharmaceuticals doing drug discovery for cancer and Alzheimer’s disease. Her work in the biofuel industry was focused on bacterial fermentation of biomass feedstocks to make butanol and fuel grade ethanol.

With a nod to her culinary passions, Laura worked as a line cook and pastry chef for a restaurant in Chicago and developed its entire dessert menu. She later founded her own desserts catering company before joining Impossible Foods in 2016.

Laura demonstrates a deep dedication to teaching green chemistry to K-12 students through volunteering with Beyond Benign and Citizen Schools to encourage students to engage in science and create the next generation of innovators.

In 2019, Laura was recognized on Fortune’s 40 Under 40 list.