Last month, two gourmets shared the world's most expensive hamburger at a London restaurant. They weren't too impressed. It tasted meaty. But there was an odd absence of fat and the texture was more like cake than steak. However, the developer of the burger, physiology professor Mark Post of Maastricht University and his moneybags, Sergei Brin of Google, were well-satisfied with the proof of concept.
The meat was completely lab-grown from a culture of cow muscle stem cells. Brin put up around $330,000 to fund the experiment, which started in 2011. The stem cells were taken in a biopsy sample from a cow's shoulder and then cultured in sterile lab conditions to create thin strips of muscle tissue. The stem cells received nutrients by being dunked in foetal bovine serum, drawn from calf foetal blood. Some 20,000 strips of tissue were required to generate about 140 grammes of meat - that is, enough for one burger patty.
Post heads one of several groups of scientists experimenting with growing meat cultures in labs. Since stem cells are present in every animal, this technology could be adapted to grow pork, chicken, mutton or lamb, or more exotic things such as caviar or shark liver. In theory, one biopsy could provide enough stem cell material to easily grow 20,000 tonnes of lab meat.
Post says he has to work on adding fat (imagine cooking zero-fat meat), colour and texture into his meat cultures. Fat is easy enough since he can use stem cells taken from fatty tissues or allow stem cells to grow into fat. Colour involves introducing myoglobin, the natural substance which gives meat its colour. Texture will be tricky since it will mean miniaturised civil engineering, building edible support "skeleton walls" for stem cells to grow on, rather than developing it in thin strips. Another major material cost is expensive bovine serum; so, he is also looking at alternative nutrients.
No animal was harmed in the process of growing the meat. This is one key reason why Brin, who is an animal rights activist, was interested in funding the experiment. The animal rights group, PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) has a standing offer of $1 million for the first viable lab-grown chicken meat.
The other big reason for scientific interest is environmental. The vast majority of human beings are carnivorous by preference. Estimates suggest that only about 500 million out of the world's 6 billion-odd people are vegetarians. The demand for meat is rising as incomes improve around the world and a more carnivorous population will have a large environmental impact.
Animals consume more resources than plants and they have a bigger carbon footprint. Studies indicate if lab-grown meat could be scaled up, this could be much more environmentally sustainable than normal methods of rearing animals. Kilo for kilo, producing meat in the lab expends far less energy and it also requires less by way of food and water resources, as well as reducing methane emissions.
A study sponsored by New Harvest, a non-profit cultured meat group, was conducted by researchers from Oxford and Amsterdam University. It claims cultured meat production requires 60 per cent less energy, and results in 95 per cent lower greenhouse gas emissions, and 98 per cent lower land use compared with conventional production in Europe.
An independent study published in the Environmental Science & Technology Journal claims that lab-grown beef uses 45 per cent less energy, emits 96 per cent less in the way of greenhouse gases and requires 99 per cent less land compared to global practices. Since 70 per cent of agricultural land is devoted to raising feedstock animals, this has the potential to cause a tectonic shift in farming methods and land use.
Note, this is not genetically-modified meat - or rather, it need not be. Post did his experiments with organically-reared normal cows, without introducing any unusual non-bovine genes. Apart from lower environmental impacts, a lab process has far more control in many ways.
It can reduce or increase specific chemicals in the tissue culture as desired to reduce cholesterol and so on. It is also easier to prevent contamination from tapeworm etc, and to insulate from the various bacteria and viruses that commonly cause botulism, salmonella, bird flu, mad cow disease, swine-flu and encephalitis.
However, stabilising lab processes and adapting them for different animals and scaling up from proof-of-concept will take a while. Also, it is unclear what exactly gives a specific kind of meat its specific taste, texture etc. Inducing attractive lab-meat flavours could turn into an art, rather like brewing micro-beers or producing specific wines.
It will take massive investments to scale up to commercial levels. It may take over a decade before costs can come down to reasonable levels. Various forms of food and drug controls would also have to be passed in various nations before lab-meat could be commercially marketed as well.
There would also need to be clever marketing to sell the product to the public at large. The carnivores among us would need to be convinced that lab-meat is safe, value for money and tastes good. There is the intriguing possibility that vegetarians could put this on their menu since there are few apparent ethical reasons to avoid eating lab-meat.
There will, of course, be other ethical issues for the religious if this becomes a mainstay on supermarket shelves. Does lab-meat qualify as halal, kosher, or vegetarian? One can see Jewish Talmudic scholars and Islamic hadith experts debating this. Also, can a devout Hindu eat lab-beef or a Jain sample lab-meat without feeling queasy? These will be points for philosophers to ponder.
Disclaimer: These are personal views of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion of www.business-standard.com or the Business Standard newspaper
