Special report: 'In vitro' beef - it's the meat of the future

[dipsydoodle]

A week tomorrow, at an exclusive west London venue, the most expensive beefburger in history will be nervously cooked and served before an invited audience. Costing somewhere in the region of £250,000, the 5oz burger will be composed of synthetic meat, grown in a laboratory from the stem cells of a slaughtered cow.

The scientist behind the "in vitro" burger believes synthetic meat could help to save the world from the growing consumer demand for beef, lamb, pork and chicken. The future appetite for beef alone, for instance, could easily lead to the conversion of much of the world's remaining forests to barren, manicured pastures by the end of this century.

The precious patty will be made of some 3,000 strips of artificial beef, each the size of a rice grain, grown from bovine stem cells cultured in the laboratory. Scientists believe the public demonstration will be "proof of principle", possibly leading to artificial meat being sold in supermarkets within five to 10 years.

Stem cells taken from just one animal could, in theory, be used to make a million times more meat than could be butchered from a single beef carcass. The reduction in the need for land, water and feed, as well as the decrease in greenhouse gases and other environmental pollutants, would change the environmental footprint of meat eating.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/special-report-in-vitro-beef--its-the-meat-of-the-future-8735104.html

[MADem]

1. If it tasted good, I'd buy it.

I'm not a big beef eater, but every once in a blue moon I enjoy a steak. If it's a fake steak grown in a lab, it reduces the guilt over killing the cute little cows...

[Warpy]

26. I eat it once a year

during the first cold snap when I crave it. I ate a steak last year, prepared simply with a chipotle rub, pan seared and finished in the oven. It was grass fed beef so I couldn't cut it with the side of a fork, but it was good.

Still, if this goes into production, it's likely to produce very lean beef that is super tender without being loaded with an unhealthy amount of fat. The environmental impact will be lower and the suffering involved with becoming meat will not be an issue.

[MADem]

30. I probably get it about four times a year!

Usually when some other sport is picking up the check! Heh, heh!

I hope they clone that kobe beef--that's some nice stuff, but crazy-expensive right now!

[peacebird]

2. Nope. My meat of the future grazes happily a mile from my door on nice open grassland.

The whole Star Trek idea of replicator food makes me feel like gagging. We all know how "good for you" GMO crops are (not). Can't wait to read the unbiased scientific studies about this mess.

[peacebird]

13. I "shop" at my neighbors farm, buying half a cow and a quarter pig on the hoof once a year.

We don't eat beef or pork every day, and use the meat as a side dish or "condiment" to the grains and veggies. That said, I will still avoid petri-dish products just as I avoid grocery store pink slimed 'beef'.

[Cirque du So-What]

9. It's not a GMO

How do they make it?

Extraction: Dr. Mark Post and his team at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands, take muscle stem cells from living cattle through biopsy.

Cultivation: The cells are placed in nutrient broth-filled petri dishes that help the cells to grow.

Expansion: The cells are attached to biodegradable scaffolding platforms where they are “exercised” to promote bulk growth and are then stretched upon Velcro boards.

Combination: The 3000 muscle strips and approximately 200 fat strips are minced together to created synthetic hamburger meat.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/2013/04/ill-have-the-test-tube-burger-please/

Nothing in there about modifying the DNA whatsoever.

[peacebird]

14. I understand, but the "nutrition filled broth" reminds me of the pink slime we heard about recently

Did't the industry have a nice healthful sounding description for that as well? And inChina some enterprising souls found they could add melamine to milk so it tested as higher in protein... Sadly plastic 'protein' didn't work out so well for the babies who drank it.

Let's just say I do not trust corporations (who *will* put profit margins above safety), and who will be determining how to produce this "meat" at the lowest possible cost.

[MADem]

31. Pink slime is the little teeny bits of meat stuck to bones, that is wrestled free

by tossing an ammonia product on 'em, and then whirled in a blender and mixed up with lips, noses and arseholes and other unsavory chunks.

It's not stem cells in a nutrient base.

[Cirque du So-What]

21. I agree that creating GMOs is not inherently evil

but I accept the possibility of some modifications causing health problems, even after clinical trials show no ill effects from consuming them. It's the effects that may not show up for years which concern me. Yes, there's far too much woo out there regarding GMOs, but as the technology advances, it's increasingly likely that Big Ag will become more cavalier with their modifications.

[Skink]

3. Soon after the Big Invitro Mac debuts

[Amak8]

5. I think agriculture is responsible for 20% of GHG emissions.

[Cirque du So-What]

10. You are correct

Consumption of water resources and pollution of those same waters must also be considered.

[Happyhippychick]

8. Thrilled

To be a vegetarian.

[LastDemocratInSC]

11. I can't wait to see the TV commercials for this

Instead of dusty, tired cowboys grilling steaks around the chuck-wagon after a long day of cow punching ... geeks in lab coats sitting around a table eating from petri dishes with pickle forks.

[stlsaxman]

12. i'll have to tell my vegetarian friends that won't eat "anything that thinks".

this stuff will never have been consiousness.

not to rub their faces in it but to honestly ask how they feel about this.

[Berlum]

15. They will undoubtedly agree that scientists need to start thinking

[Yo_Mama]

16. It depends on the cost

If they can't make it cheaper than "real" meat, this isn't going anywhere.

US per capita meat consumption has been declining for years now, and the projection is for a continued decline (second to last page in this USDA outlook):
http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/949018/ldpm221.pdf

Most of that is because households can't afford to buy as much.

[RebelOne]

20. As a vegetarian I would eat it.

I do not eat anything with hair, fur or feathers and would welcome synthetic meat. I have had a desire for a good fillet mignon and it would be nice to have it when if I knew that the animal was not killed.

[dipsydoodle]

23. I think that is the view that many would take.

.

[aristocles]

28. In vitro beef is grown from living animal cells

These cells die to become burgers or steak.

[flvegan]

29. Sadly, I think they are far, far off from that.

In vitro burger is one thing (thousands of beef "rice pellets&quot mashed into a burger like ground chuck. A "cut" of meat, with marbling and whatnot...I don't know about that. Hopefully, if this goes over well, they will go further with it and eventually they get it right for all beef from burgers to ribeyes.

I don't think I would eat it, regardless. The thought turns my stomach. No in vitro swordfish? Let me at it!

[Initech]

22. To quote the great Lewis Black:

"I've seen how this ends. And it ends with Charlton Heston running down the street screaming SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!!!!!!!"

[mick063]

25. Food is already processed to the umpteenth degree.

And I have been eating it. I would prefer to go back in time and eat a Wendy's or KFC from the 70's, but those days are long gone. You young folks would have died for a 1976 Wendy's burger. I lived off of them.

I'll eat these stem cell burgers as well. I'm hoping they don't get mixed into pink slime.

[SA-Bound]

27. The issue is going to be texture

I have no doubt that they can "grow" a substance that tastes like beef and has the same nutritional statistics.

We're used to eating muscle fiber, even when it's ground up. I think this is where they're going to have the greatest issues.

[kestrel91316]

32. No thanks. Although I DID have a yummy veggie hot dog today at

Slaw Dogs. But there is no pretense that it is actually meat.

You can keep your laboratory-grown Soylent Petri.

[n2doc]

33. ...until it gets infected with prions....

viruses, and bacteria. I know what to expect from big ag/big meat.