The world population is growing at a rapid pace - and our hunger for meat is never satisfied as well.
Almost HALF of the total harvest of the world is being fed to livestock!
Meat production requires a very high energetic footprint - it takes 75 times more energy and water to produce meat than corn. Additionally, the area of vegetation needed to produce the necessary food for the cattle and livestock in Europe is 7 times bigger than the area of the EU itself.
Within the next few decades, we can't continue with this lifestyle - it will have extremely destructive consequences not only on humanity, but also animals and energetic resources.
That's where Lab-Grown meat comes in - it offers a solution to all of these problems!
The meat is real meat - just without the need of keeping and slaughtering live animals.
Lab-Grown meat is sustainably farmed from animal stem cells, and is supposed to taste like any other "regular" meat.
Memphis Meats
Amongst others, the company Memphis Meats creates this type of "clean meat" (also called synthetic meat, cultured meat or in vitro meat), a new approach to sustainable meat and potentially even the future of food.
They have currently managed to create lab-grown meatballs, chicken and duck.
Memphis meats is even supported by famous Investors and Billionaires like Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Virgin Group founder Richard Branson, who have just donated a staggering amount of $17 million to the startup.
There are significant problems with the way meat is currently produced – environmental degradation, the slaughtering of billions of animals annually and health issues from bacterial contamination.
By growing meat from animal cells we believe we can significantly improve upon all of these issues. We expect our products to require up to 90% less environmental inputs, to have a much lower risk of bacterial contamination, and to entirely detach animal slaughter from the meat production process.
We want to give people the ability to continue to eat the meat they’ve always loved, without the negative impacts on the planet, the body and the animals.
How does this lab-grown meat work?
First, researchers take tiny meat cells from an animal, for example through a sample or with a painless biopsy.
Then they identify cells which are capable of self-renewal, which means that they don't need to return to animals for subsequent samples once the initial stem cells are obtained.
They know exactly which types of cells are needed to achieve the specific flavour, aroma and textures they're looking for.
Next, these cells are enriched with nutrients which help the cells grow and turn them into "real", edible meat.
And finally, after around 4-6 weeks of lab-growing, the meat can be harvested.
“Our goal is to entirely remove the animal from the meat production process.”, says CEO Uma Valeti.
Our meat is delicious! It’s real meat, and life-long meat-eaters immediately recognize it
and enjoy it. The way we make meat is an improvement in a few important ways. First, we expect our process
to require less than a tenth of the land and water and less than half of the energy that it takes to produce
conventional meat. Second, our goal is to produce meat without using animals to address some of the animal
welfare issues of current meat production. Third, we believe our meat is safer. We’ve all read about food
borne illnesses coming from conventional meat, and our process reduces that risk dramatically.
Other examples of lab-grown animal products
Memphis Meats certainly isn't the only company looking into the potential of creating lab-grown animal products.
Startups like FutureMeat and SuperMeat are all aiming to create an alternative for the conventional way we produce meat.
And this field of research isn't even limited to meat only - Finless Foods for example is a startup that aims to create lab-grown fish from stem cells.
The cells are also growing in a "brewery-like environment”, and have already succeeded in accumulating a stable fish cell culture and getting the cells to divide in the bioreactor.
Clean meat offers the delicious and nutritious treats - all while being produced by scientists only.
It offers a solution to the growing problem of feeding the world population, and fighting animal slaughtering. This way, it might even be a possible alternative for vegetarians and vegans whose priority are animals.
What's your opinion about this lab-grown, "clean" meat?
Do you think it offers a real alternative for the future of meat, and maybe even the future of food in general ?
© Sirwinchester
Eat eat 🍝🍗☕ So i used to work in a restaurant part time for 3years during my college days and boy the food they wasted.
Im unsure and cant comment on the lab grown meat or how safe it'd be for consumption(research technology is promising); but if we not waste what we already have, we'd have more than enough to feed everybody.
Thank you for your comment, this is soooo true! food waste is a huge problem and I can't understand why we're not fighting against it more.
People think everything is in abundance. 2 people come to eat and order food as if 8 people are in the table. I think all restaurants should place a sign 'no waste food, order only what you can eat, if you waste you will have to pay extra'. I have seen it in couple restaurants in Singapore, but cant recall which ones.
Probably a good idea.
I prefer to go vegetarian
The Future Expansion begins with this! Unfortunately, humans need this to overcome the population growth problem, so we can take over other planets.
Great post @sirwinchester . I actually donated 10$ (yeah not much I know) to their Indiegogo campaign. I believe that pushing for lab grown meat will have a big positive effect on so many levels. 1. Access to food to everyone in an age of population growth and increased density of living in urban areas. 2. Reducing deforestation as so much of the destruction of forests is in order to prepare land for cattle. 3. More moral with regards to reducing unnecessary suffering of animals (not that I'm an animal right's activist or vegan, but I do think industrialized food production causes too much animal pain and suffering. So happy to support all of these developments, and hope to have a lab -grown Burger on the menu somewhere close soon ^^
Just remember to exercise it...
yo as long as its healthy I dont care lol if its going to F up my body though count me out. It very well could be healthier then eating live animals and well... I guess if you vegan you could eat it? hhmm
I will give it a bite when available
Hi to Everybody! Mr @SirWinchester... hope you are fine too! Cool post and a little quote in here, I started in a natural way, two month ago to eat no more meat... Just couldn't, it was not forced, was natural and my body just asked for it. I think that we, all, (you, me and he and she are descendents from different alien races) and some have a blood, some others other, One kind of body, etc, etc..and some needs meat and others not. More than a cultural matter I think is genetical... By the way if I can choose, I could like not to eat meat... but somethings escapes from us. And nowadays Y back to eat meat again... No guilt, no nothing, not even think it's wrong. Just a sense...
Interesting! Thanks for sharing your views. Yes I agree with you, sometimes it's just a natural urge not to eat meat because our body doesn't really need it
Yes it is the future of meat. More greenhouse gases are released by the meat industry than are released from energy. Couple that with the fact that a pound of beef requires thousands of gallons of water along with a huge amount of land means that we will ultimately move away from the traditional meat methods. With stem cells production, there is no reason for range cows.
It can't be worse than Taco Bell meat...
Just remember, in the end, Soylent Green is people!
Ahah, yeah when I read the title of the post that was what came to mind. ⚗
Crazy what they think of.
This should make it much easier to raise
tur-duck-en
:-)
If it is created in a lab I dont like it, I prefer the natural meet with moderation. But because of world population these types of solutions are now on the table.
Just because something is not natural it doesn't mean it is unhealthy (appeal to nature fallacy). Food prepared in a laboratory is made under controlled conditions ensuring it is safe and free from contaminants. Just about all food is processed in some way.
Grown in bovine amniotic fluid, yay.
This should eliminate all the vegetarians once and for all if it becomes mainstream.
Yes I thought so too - at least those who don't eat the meat for the animal's sake should be convinced!
But apparently half vegans still wouldn't do it.
Many believe this is the best option for optimal health. So many are not trying to save animals, they just want to be healthier.
You don't need meat for optimal health. Vegans are being hypocritical if they are going to consciously eat lab-grown meat.
Those must be the ones who are vegan just to say they're vegan. Like the people who demand gluten-free meals but don't know what gluten is.
Great works, I wish you success
Follow me and upvote my post , why ? because i'll do the same
https://steemit.com/life/@ghyassine/follow-me-and-upvote-my-post-why-because-i-ll-do-the-same
CommentWealth trolls for trolls and spams the spammers... please be aware @ghyassine that consistent spam comments like yours might eventually result in flags, which hurt your reputation and earning potential. Linking to your own posts in another Steemian's comment thread is really bad form. Next time, try engaging with the author in a way that builds true community here on Steemit!
Scary stuff. In BC Canada they are making GMO fish. I love science, but...
Great post :)
Good post, you create in post, follow to my block.
Good post, you create in post, follow to my block.
Wow! Great post about the future of animals. It is a great steps, science has changed our lives immensely, really it is a out of imagination of we people that meat produced in leboratoies. Great post great information from great steemian's. Have a great day friend, Happy steeming.
Yep restaurants and markets trowing tons of food away. If this lab-meat would taste like a real one I'll certainly switch to it :)
it takes 75 times more energy and water to produce meat than corn
The carbohydrates in corn causes diabetes in humans over time.
Meat does not.
Many civilizations that eat carbs as staples have low levels of diabetes e.g. rural Okinawans eat considerable amounts of sweet potatoes, rural Chinese eat rice, etc. It is when Western diets high in animal products start to be adopted that levels of cancer and diabetes increases. Carbs may be harmful when you have diabetes, but it is fat that causes diabetes. Fat accumulates in the pancreas (called myointracellular lipids) causing the pancreas to stop secreting insulin, and fat accumulating in or around other cells blocks sugar from entering cells and also prevents insulin from working to transport nutrients into cells. Carbs only cause diabetes if you eat a considerable amount of carbs that it gets converted into fat. However, protein and fat, if eaten in excess, if make you fat as well.
http://www.webmd.com/diabetes/video/kahn-eating-sugar-cause-diabetes
nope.
that's not the way digestion works.
Humans are omnivores but mostly meat eaters.
carbs are the same thing as sugar when digested.
by the way.
The Okinawan diet has only 30% of the sugar and 15% of the grains of the average Japanese dietary intake.
Nice post
This is a fantastic innovation in the making. As long as the "lab-grown meat", doesn't have any negative side effects on health and environment, it will be good for the "carnivores" to switch over to it.
We have already caused a lot of pain and harm to "sentient" animals. Its our evil karma that has been piling up as sin and comes back to us in form of various problems and stress. If it is not right to kill someone just because we want to rob that person and get rich, then neither it is correct to get "proteins" by causing such immense pain to "sentient" animals.
Hope, this makes us more compassionate.
yeah we will be......
amazing
It is a great step for the defense of natural energy,
due to the fact the growing age of the Earth, the more human needs, up to one time nature was not able to bear them anymore, there was such thing as drought, severe heat, with energy company such as this will greatly help reduce the burden of Earth, and human needs, I hope in the future not only of meat are made like that, but also other foods such as rice.. Therefore all our energy saving, and I hope the company could develop throughout the country. thank you.
life is very importent money
If you vote me, you will not be able to leave anybody with you, you will vote as you go ahead but we will give support to each other
When I was in the army, I've always wondered why is there a never ending supply of chicken drumsticks and wings for our meals. Makes me wonder if every piece is lab grown. 😏
Follow for follow 😄
It will be more healthier than natural?? i dont think so. but mayb. let see. followed you kindly do a favour plz spread my post as much you can if you are real human. your one click can change my life.
https://steemit.com/story/@kumar.malhotra/dear-all-stemians-help-me-i-really-need-it-seriously
Wow! Thanks for sharing this.
If this is really becoming something"normal" maybe we will see a better world.
this is so crazy, tough to wrap my head around this
@sirwinchester - very interesting article - thanks for posting it. Personally - I'm a fan of REAL fresh off the grill meat - but I would be curious to see what this tastes like just for fun
How nice. I will not have to be a vegetarian:)
good job
Lab grown meat is a useful contribution to feeding the world, but I just think it's totally unnecessary, and the risk in it is that it probably wouldn't be possible to upscale it without giving away even more power to giant corporations such as Monsanto. I've actually nothing against the bio-ethics of growing meat in labs, and I trust that science can do it safely, it's just given away power to those Corporate bastards is a problem - they'd end up owning cow DNA and then yr small scale farmers in Africa would have to pay them for every new calf their heard produces.
If people must eat meat, then I think integrated, localised polycultures are the way forwards, which can include animals - I recommend checking out https://permies.com/ for all sorts of extremely viable and well researched integrated food systems.
Obvious examples include keeping a couple of cows and chickens which provide milk and eggs, and manure, and meat! Living alongside your veggies.
However, this wouldn't sort out the meat in the mega-city problem and in general I think the world will probably also have to eat a whole lot less meat if it also wants land for forests.
At the risk of sounding smug, if everyone just went vegan none of this would even be an issue, mind you the chances of that happening are about as small as a Corproate free lab-meat future.
Then there's always the Soylent Green Solution? Look it up if you've no idea what I'm talking about!
Very nice well-thought out post, about the right length, and from a teacher's perspective very educational!
You're still forcefully taking from animals in order to grow lab-grown meat. Consistent vegans wouldn't support this.
It's a step in the right direction. There are going to be hurdles though.
A lot of countries have already banned a many genetically modified food (GMOs). You're going to see a lot of skepticism, and rightfully so, before people feed this to their kids.
There will also probably be issues over getting the right texture in the meat. Lastly, just because the meat is lab grown does not ensure that it is free of contamination. A ranch is not rampant with disease when properly managed. The animal's meat is safely contained within the body protected by its immune system. A massively scaled meat culturing operation could easily have dire problems with infection.
Guilt-free meat though will be a massive plus though, so I wish them success.
I'm not sure it will ever be the answer to world hunger, but lab grown meat is still a very promising idea. It removes the moral question of whether or not eating meat is acceptable, so you could see a big drop in the number of vegetarians and vegans, thought obviously some do it for health reasons rather than moral.
I think another impact it would have is environmental. Raising livestock has a massive carbon footprint which could be eliminated so long as the energy source behind the lab grown meat is renewable. Nuclear powered meat factory? Sign me up!
Why do you think this would "remove the moral question" for vegetarians or vegans?
Being a vegan for the true moral/ethical reasons means not consuming any animal products...'tiny meat cells' from an animals body is obviously coming from the animal. The morality of being a vegan for me means that I don't feel that I am superior to any living being on this planet so the moral question is still very much in tact. And the idea that it's done through a "painless biopsy"...Last time I heard, biopsies aren't a walk in the park. Animals feel pain just like humans. There are many many vegans in the world and we don't see them falling on the ground dying from inadequate diets so its very apparent that it is unnecessary to eat animal products to sustain our bodies.
Anything relating to the use and exploitation of another living creature will always be a moral question for me. One that is very easy for me to know the answer.
If the cells are grown in a lab absent a conscious being, what's the difference between them and plant cells?
This is the first I've heard of lab grown meat. I can follow how it's processed but just the thought of it makes it hard to swallow.