The old question of which came first, the chicken or the egg, takes on new meaning as scientists advance lab-grown, or cultured, meats.
Earlier this spring, San Francisco-based Memphis Meats announced the successful production of clean poultry developed from animal cells.
Quantum shift in technology Stemming from developments in nanotechnology, food scientists are taking stem cells from live animals and using proprietary cell cultures of oxygen, sugars and minerals to make them grow inside bioreactor tanks.
Memphis Meats reported its cost to produce the first runs of cultured poultry to be in the neighborhood of $9,000 a pound, obviously higher than an average cost of $3 per pound for traditional chicken breasts.
Pioneering this innovation was a Dutch scientist, Mark Post, who in 2013 produced the world’s first lab-grown beef burger, a 5-ounce patty grown from cow stem cells.
In the meantime, other investors are likewise interested in the Earth-bound market, noting that the U.S. consumers spend $90 billion annually on chicken alone.
China’s 1.4 billion citizens consume more than 6 billion pounds of duck annually.
Researchers predict cultured meat could reduce energy usage anywhere from 7 to 45 percent, with 78 to 96 percent reducing in greenhouse gasses.
Brin, in an interview regarding Post’s work in beef, credited the potential environmental impact as being as much a driver as the financial.
The speed of expectation While traditional agriculture producers have a few years to go before products such as these become more commercially available, reason for discussion is as present as the question of regulations.