Here's the recording of my new deep lecture on the cost drivers of
#cultivatedmeat
, which summarizes the current knowledge around media and infrastructure and teaches you how to think about costs in this developing industry.
@SenFettermanPA
@SenateAgDems
Cultivated meat is real meat and seafood produced without:
Antibiotics
Pathogens (E. coli, Salmonella)
Animal slaughter
while using significantly less land, producing less air and water pollution, and having a lower carbon footprint when combined with renewable energy
It's been almost 2 weeks since the historic announcement of FDA's green light for cultivated chicken from
@upsidefoods
. This coincided with over 100 pages of new information related to the production and safety of
#cultivatedmeat
.
So what did we learn?
If you showed this picture at a stem cell scientific conference 6 years ago and said it was made from cultured chicken cells and would be legally sold to U.S. consumers in 2023, you would have been laughed out of the room.
But it would all be true...
Congrats to
@GOODMeat
and
@upsidefoods
— both companies received the first approvals to sell "cell-cultivated" chicken in the U.S. today.
Probably won't be the last company in 2023 to receive a similar approval 👀
Some thoughts on (1) whether immortalized cells for
#cultivatedmeat
production should be compared to eating cancer (2) whether consuming them would give you cancer & (3) whether long-term studies are needed to ensure the safety of cultivated meat...
The most comprehensive study to date of
#cultivatedmeat
production was just published, led by scientists from
@believermeats
Much of the data in this paper will likely make up their safety dossier for regulatory approval in the US
What did we learn? 👇
20-50% of milk samples in the U.S. are now testing positive for avian flu, which is also spreading to and killing cats in close contact with cows on farms (who are likely drinking raw milk).
tick tock
Congrats to
@AlephFarms
for being the 3rd company to receive regulatory approval for
#cultivatedmeat
Key things to know:
- 1st approval in Israel
- 1st for cultivated beef
- 1st entirely animal-free process (no serum)
More details in thread:
You probably saw these recent headlines based on a pair of pre-print studies. So is it true?
I spoke to many experts & there are multiple compounding errors w/ the assumptions from these pre-print studies
Read my open letter/critique to the authors:
The study that this headline is based on is a pre-print, and the claim is based on the authors' assumptions that media inputs require purification analogous to the pharma industry:
Lab-grown meat could be 25 times worse for the climate than regular beef unless scientists find ways to overhaul energy-intensive steps in its production
Germany is becoming an interesting case study. Its new national dietary guidelines call for 75% plant-based foods, its per capita meat consumption is down 12% in the last decade, & it invested €38M into a protein transition last year
Akin to Norway's early lead in EV adoption
Didn't have time to read the 150 pages of new information associated with
@goodmeat
's FDA pre-market consultation for cultivated chicken?
Key info in this thread.
A lot of discussion of the commercial viability of
#cultivatedmeat
, raised by this recent article by
@joefassler
. It’s expected for a nascent, hi-tech industry
My job is to be asking these questions as well. Sharing some food for thought:
Germany announces €38M into a sustainable protein transition, with funds earmarked for R&D into plant-based and
#cultivatedmeat
and establishing a "proteins of the future" center 🇩🇪
These funds are just for 2024, so a big opportunity for more to follow
USDA approves label for "cell-cultivated chicken" from
@upsidefoods
and
@GOODMeat
. Both companies are one step away from selling products to consumers in the U.S.
Hopefully we'll just call it chicken in due time...
More animal proteins produced by precision fermentation are coming to market. Yesterday
@newculturefoods
announced its casein protein to be used in a mozzarella product was deemed safe for sale
Non-animal-based cheeses won't be bad forever.
World's first undergraduate degree program (minor) in cellular agriculture launches at Tuft's University.
A signal of progress but also of how early this endeavor actually is.
We've been curating
#cultivatedmeat
publications for the last several years
Happy to share we (led by
@Claire_Bomkamp
) turned this into an open database
Over 400 publications, patents, & theses filterable by tech. area, keywords, topic, etc
Key Florida House and Senate committees have voted to ban cultivated meat. The ban is ostensibly about consumer protection & public health.
Here's a photo of the diverse array of consumer & health advocates lobbying for the bill. (H/t
@DrFarazHarsini
)
Can't believe these are the images being used... I don't even think this is a cultivated meat product. Also, the FDA evaluated cultivated chicken
🎯JOURNALISTS: We have an image database of real
#cultivatedmeat
prototypes that is free to use. 👇👇👇
Congratulations to
@upsidefoods
for receiving the first pre-market "no questions" letter from
@US_FDA
for
#cultivatedmeat
. 🥳
The review process began in October 2021.
UPSIDE will need grants of inspection from
@USDA
before the products can be sold.
Animal gelatin is one of the most common reagents used in cell culture.
Apparently pumpkin seed protein works just as well.
#cultivatedmeat
will drive all animal cell culture industries to be animal-free.
You will be increasingly told that cultivated meat is made of cancer cells, terrible for the environment, unregulated, & unsafe.
That message is bought and paid for by professional astroturfers. And of course none of it is true.
by
@mattsreynolds1
Proud to have been one of the vice chairs for the
@FAO
/
@WHO
consultation in Singapore on food safety aspects of
#cultivatedmeat
.
The full report, including 3 country case studies & identification of potential safety hazards, is available for download:
Scientists
@mosa_meat
quietly published another study detailing their development of serum-free media for bovine muscle cell culture. The serum-free media performs at ~97% efficiency compared to serum-containing media.
Several studies now show that grass-fed/regenerative systems have higher emissions & feed fewer people while using 2-3x more land. The opposite of scalable.
Cultivated meat is likely to use 60-90% less land than conventional meat production & has the advantage that its
New study on 100 beef production systems shows evidence that grass-fed cows are not more sustainable at all.
"We find that pasture-finished operations have 20% higher production emissions and 42% higher carbon footprint than grain-finished systems."
Sharing my perspective on recent discussions around the developing
#cultivatedmeat
industry, covering aspects I felt were missing.
Taking some inspiration from
@naval
&
@mattwridley
, I titled it "Rational optimism for cultivated meat."
A few key pts:
The first
#cultivatedmeat
in Poland was taste-tested yesterday. A decellularized spinach leaf embedded with chicken myocytes. Led by Stanislaw Loboziak of the Copernicus Science Center in Warsaw
A lot of people laughed when 1st hearing
#cultivatedmeat
production being compared to breweries, where it could be made in the back of the house of a restaurant, w/ production visible through glass walls. 5 yrs later & it's already happening in Israel
I want to add some color to the key points of contention highlighted two months ago in The Counter article.
This will be the last I'll say on this for a while. Long 🧵!
I've made some fairly extensive updates to the
#cultivatedmeat
science series on cell lines, bioprocessing, & bioengineering to highlight industry growth & on-the-job learning from the past year. New seafood-focused content coming soon as well. 👇👇👇
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has stated the country's intention to develop safety & regulatory guidelines to create a thriving market for
#cultivatedmeat
and cell ag, citing it as an important way to realize a sustainable food system. 🇯🇵
Made it to 3,000 followers 🥳
By design, I keep my feed solely focused on news and views related to
#cultivatedmeat
& alt proteins.
No "current thing" politics, covid, fake guru threads, etc.
And I plan on keeping it that way. Thanks for following along!
The study that this headline is based on is a pre-print, and the claim is based on the authors' assumptions that media inputs require purification analogous to the pharma industry:
This week was the 1st time we had a cattle rancher reach out saying they want to become a stem cell donor for the
#cultivatedmeat
industry
"I will do whatever you need to advance the science"
"Cell ag needs to be the next chapter....the current model is maxed out"
In the past 3 months, the subreddit focused on
#cultivatedmeat
has grown from ~100 to over 10,000 subscribers. I recommend those with industry knowledge subscribe and inform those that will be early adopters of the tech
A life cycle & techno-economic assessment of
#cultivatedmeat
by
@CEDelft
show that large-scale production can massively reduce environmental impacts & be cost-competitive w/ some forms of conventional meat by 2030. Blog below & key findings in thread 👇:
The 2nd commercial-scale
#cultivatedmeat
facility in the U.S. has been announced outside of Chicago, IL
@UPSIDEfoods
will invest $140M, creating >75 new jobs, & producing ~13kton/yr at max capacity. $15M in state grants/loans/tax credits were given
.
@AlephFarms
becomes the 1st cultivated meat company to submit safety info for approval in Europe.
In this case, they targeted Switzerland, which has an independent regulatory process that is faster than the lengthy process for the rest of the E.U.
Japanese
#cultivatedmeat
company Integriculture announces commercial launch of their serum-free, fully food-grade basal medium formulation, which they estimate at ~1.5% of the cost of conventional media. Appears to have soy as a key ingredient.
Good rundown of how countries in the Asia Pacific are embracing cultivated meat, in stark contrast to certain EU countries and U.S. states
Very possible that Asia could dominate supply chains of future foods as they do with batteries and solar panels
Did you know?
@BlueNaluInc
and
@mosa_meat
have both stated that they do not need/use animal serum to produce their products. Any other companies in
#cultivatedmeat
with similar statements? (1)
(2)
#cultivatedmeat
does not require serum & many companies have already cleared the hurdle of removing animal serum from production, as detailed in the referenced study by
@mosa_meat
.
We will see this borne out in approvals in the coming months.
Our new study cited:
"cultivated meat emits up to 92% less carbon gas equivalents than conventional beef while using up to 90% less land—freeing up space for the more sustainable farming practices beloved by traditional agriculture enthusiasts"
Serum-free media for the growth of primary bovine myoblasts. "We conclude that serum-free media stimulate exponential cell expansion, albeit not to the extent of the current growth medium containing up to 30% serum" cc
@mosa_meat
Eating cultivated chicken boosts acceptance levels after it's consumed. Why? It tastes like chicken because it is chicken
1st study to examine consumers who are actually eating cultivated meat (
@GOODMeat
chicken in Singapore), not just reading about it
Congratulations to
@GOODMeat
for becoming the second
#cultivatedmeat
company to complete the FDA pre-market consultation process, concluding that their cultivated chicken product is safe to eat. 🐔
"Alternative proteins are an imperative if we are to stay within planetary boundaries" -
@ajarviscali
of
@BezosEarthFund
, which announced $60M into new academic research centers for alternative proteins
Protocols for in-house, low-cost production of commonly-used growth factors derived from bovine, chicken, & piscine orthologs in E. coli
A collaboration between
@GoodFoodInst
and
@NewHarvestOrg
funded labs
@torontopeter
@cjsemper
One of the most comprehensive studies I've seen on cultivated meat to date (open access).
All serum-free too, which is now starting to become the norm even in academic labs working in the field.
Finally got to experience my first
#cultivatedmeat
tastings during a recent trip to Singapore
Shrimp from S. Korean startup CellMEAT and chicken from
@goodmeat
. Both hybrid products incorporate plant-based ingredients.
Chicago-based
#cultivatedmeat
company
@CleverCarnivore
raises $7M in oversubscribed seed round.
A good example of a "2.0" company where differentiation strategy lies in exceptional performance in a single key area — in this case, media cost reduction.
People are taking pictures of gross-looking chicken legs they've found at grocery stores and claiming it was "lab-grown" and the conspiracy theorists are eating it up.
More fear-mongering of a product that is barely even available 🙃
This weekend,
@UPSIDEfoods
completed the first legal sale of
#cultivatedmeat
in the United States.
We have a huge opportunity to lead — time to invest heavily in R&D and infrastructure to lower costs and de-risk scale up
Important thread. No matter which way you cut it, cycling feed through animals is very inefficient & comes at a huge opportunity cost.
#cultivatedmeat
requires about 60%, 70%, and up to 95% less land than chicken/pork/beef production, respectively.
Climate impact of our diet is reported in terms of CO₂ *emissions*.
But there's also an opportunity cost. If we weren't using farmland we could store CO₂ by regrowing forests & wild habitats
In my latest article I look at the opportunity costs of food:
In the U.S., individual states are banning and criminalizing the sale of cultivated meat
In S. Korea, the government fast-tracked its regulatory approval pathway and is investing millions to foster commercialization.
Survey data suggest up to 90% of S. Korean consumers would
Commentary on some interesting public data points about what we know about the technology behind
@FutureMeat1
, the highest capitalized
#cultivatedmeat
company at ~$387M raised to date.
🧵👇
Our new study in The International Journal of LCA assesses the environmental impact of
#cultivatedmeat
when produced at scale in 2030 compared to conventional chicken, pork, & beef production
Overview slides below w/ highlights in thread & link to webinar
New LCA whitepaper from cultivated chicken manufacturer
@_SuperMeat_
Cultivated chicken produced w/ renewable energy has up to a 47% decreased carbon footprint compared to conventional chicken (also produced w/ renewables).
Large benefits are claimed in other areas (land, air
Many animal cell culture practices exist just because that's the way they've always been done. Rarely anyone questions why.
The use of gelatin & other animal proteins as necessary adhesives is an example of this. We have to use matrigel, geltrex, fibronectin, laminin, etc, & we
New
#cultivatedmeat
techno-economic analysis by
@ucdavis_cmc
!
This pre-print models costs in large-scale bioreactors, finding a cost range of $13 to $30.40/kg, w/ further opportunity for cost reduction if assumed media costs are reduced. Summary below:
Excited to see
@OmeatOfficial
, led by tissue engineer (&
@GoodFoodScience
grantee)
@khademh
is now out of stealth w/ $40M raised, including Tyson.
Their approach involves sourcing cells/blood from a small herd of adult cattle to grow their bovine cells
#Cultivatedmeat
and seafood companies raised $1.4B last year, 3x more than 2020.
More details in our forthcoming state of the industry reports next month.
Another publication from
@mosa_meat
dropped last week, which characterizes their cultivated bovine fat production.
Over 28 days of culture, cultivated fat looks, cooks, tastes, & contains a similar lipid profile to subcutaneous fat from a cow.
Here's how they do it:
In a new database, we're tracking 42
#cultivatedmeat
facilities that have been built or announced around the world. Info on stated facility sizes, capacities, locations, & operational status
Link below (filter by protein category > cultivated):
Our Science of cultivated meat landing page is now current thru the end of 2022.
This page is the most concise summary of the current scientific progress & challenges. It includes links to key resources & deep dives of 100,000+ words of research.
We really need academics & cultivated meat companies to show DATA in conference presentations. Too much rehashing of statements with little substance or insight attached. Need more research in academia to speed this up...
Calling all
#cultivatedmeat
researchers: There is still a MASSIVE shortage of available meat- and seafood-relevant cell lines for the academic community. If you've developed a cell line, PLEASE deposit the cells w/ GFI's biobanking partner,
@kerafast
:
The Finnish government awarded €46M in the past year to build two alt protein fermentation facilities
We need this type of gov support for alt protein infrastructure in the US
€12M to Enifer:
€34M to Solar Foods:
Vow opens its pilot facility, the first in Australia.
There are now around 12 to 15 similarly-sized
#cultivatedmeat
facilities operating around the world.
-2,200L production capacity 📈
-Able to produce 10-30 tonnes of cultured meat annually at full production capacity 🥩
-One of the largest cultured meat factories on the planet 🌏
-Right in Vow's HQ in Sydney, Australia 🇦🇺
(2/3)
New report out today on media & growth factor trends in the
#cultivatedmeat
(CM) industry using data from 40 companies. Some key results in thread & full study:
When accounting for the carbon opportunity cost of land, the avg global carbon footprint of beef is ~12 to 63x higher than the anticipated carbon footprint of
#cultivatedmeat
.
As grids get greener over time, the comparison will trend closer to 63x than 12x.
If carbon
And there it is! Congrats to
@eatjust
for being granted the first approved
#cultivatedmeat
product in the world [in Singapore]. IMO, this is the 2nd most important event in the history of the industry behind
@MarkPost6
reveal of the 1st burger in 2013.
20 years ago, Italy banned field trials of GMOs and they still prevent GM crops from being grown in the country.
As a result, they import millions of tons of GM soy every year to feed to animals.
4D chess.
🚨BREAKING: Controversial cultivated meat ban passes into law in Italy after months of discussion. The bill also restricts use of ‘meaty’ terms like ‘salami’ and ‘steak’ in plant-based products.
This bill risks cutting Italy off from innovation and also has wider implications:🧵
Since approving the first
#cultivatedmeat
product for sale almost 2 years ago, the
@SGFoodAgency
continues to update its guidance on novel foods.
Last week's update is the most comprehensive document for assessing the safety of
#cultivatedmeat
.
.
@mosa_meat
aims to be the first company to submit cultivated meat safety info to regulators in the E.U.
The company opened a new 30k sq. ft. production facility with 1000L bioreactors to manufacture cultivated beef
Nice to see
@AlephFarms
openly publish their protocols for deriving bovine embryonic stem cells used in the production of their cultivated steak, which is currently under regulatory review in several regions around the globe.
Looking forward to presenting at the International Responsible Use of Antibiotics in Animals conference. I'll be the only one discussing how the easiest way to reduce antibiotics in animal ag is to simply produce meat w/o animals 🤔:
.
@AlephFarms
partners with
@thermofisher
for their cell culture media supply chain
Good to see one of the largest media suppliers for life sciences diving deeper into cultivated meat
Europe's first
#cultivatedseafood
company raises €7M.
That's already over $175M of disclosed fundraises for
#cultivatedmeat
in the first quarter of 2021 (not counting Eat Just's $200M raise)