High cost can make lab-grown meat unpopular

Now that the demand for meat is growing fast and producing meat in laboratories is not impossible, would you consider having hot dogs with sausages of lab-grown meat?

Chances are less, said experts, in spite of all your genuine concerns for animal rights and the environment - primarily because of the prohibitory costs of producing lab-grown meat.

If people accept the idea of eating lab-grown meat, the biggest hurdle will be the economics, contended a group of social scientists from the Netherlands.

Laying out a possible method of producing lab-grown meat, the researchers compared the cost of production with that of the meat that are easily available.

The biggest factor determining the cost of lab-grown meat seems to be the growth medium used to culture cells, the researchers said.

Using the cheapest possible growth medium and accounting for the medium alone, 1 kg of meat would cost eight euros (Rs.638), as compared to the cost of five euros (Rs.399) for a kilogram of minced meat in the Netherlands.

Using skeletal muscle stem cells from a cow, Dutch researcher Mark Post created the first lab-grown hamburger in 2013.

The current method of meat production is regarded unsustainable as the process consumes vast energy and pollutes the environment.

The comments appeared in the journal Trends in Biotechnology.