Dr. Yu is currently the founder and CSO of MicroFarmtory LLC & AquaFarmtory Ltd, which specializes in natural protein and peptide production via precision fermentation. He has a B.Sc. from Dept. of Biophysics at the Fudan Univ in Shanghai, a PhD. from Dept of Biology at the Univ. of South Carolina, postdoc at the DuPont Co. He joined the Danforth Plant Science Center in 2001, serving as a Principal Investigator until 2012. He has been serving as adjunct professor at multiple universities including Washington University in St Louis and MIT. Dr. Yu co-founded and served as CEO and CSO of Conagen Inc. from 2010 till 2023, the company was one of the more active synthetic biology companies in the world. He has published more than 180 papers and patents in the field of precision fermentation and synthetic biology.