Allison Pieja

Allison’s passion for the outdoors combined with a love of science & math and a desire to change the world motivated her to pursue environmental engineering. Allison graduated from Princeton University with a B.S.E. in Civil and Environmental Engineering and then moved across the country to study Environmental Engineering at Stanford University. In her Ph.D. research at Stanford University, she pioneered the production of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) from methane in Craig Criddle’s lab. Her research focused on elucidating the role of PHA within methanotrophic cells and using this knowledge to select methane-utilizing microbes for improved PHA production. Allison has authored and contributed to numerous patents and publications in the PHA field.

Allison currently leads scale-up of Mango Materials’ technology and is focused on producing PHA from waste methane gas at a San Francisco Bay Area wastewater treatment plant. She also oversees innovation and optimization of the process. Allison has completed many trail ultramarathons and enjoys spending as much time as possible outdoors and in the mountains.