WebProNews

Tag: hamburger

  • 3D Printed Meat May Be The Future Of Food

    3D Printed Meat May Be The Future Of Food

    One of the most exciting movements in 3D printing these days is the idea that we can create human tissue. In an equally amazing innovation, the same technology can be applied to animal tissue. As such, some researchers are now looking into how we may be able to artificially grow beef and other meats to prevent animal overpopulation.

    In a recent TED Talk, Andras Forgacs, co-founder and CEO of Modern Meadow, talks about his firm’s aspirations to grow meat and leather in a lab. The process requires researchers to take cells from living animals and then growing those cells until they can be assembled into meat. This may then lead to researchers being able to 3D print meat.

    In the below video, Forgacs says that his company is currently making lab-grown leather. He shows off the very first samples of this leather and says that it being grown in a lab allows researchers to control aspects of its production that can’t be done with normal leather production. For example. lab-grown leather can be cultured to be completely transparent, or soft to the touch.

    If any of this sounds too far out for you, just remember that humans have already eaten lab-grown meat. The first lab-grown hamburger was served back in August. The taste testers reported that it tasted like meat, but was lacking in the fat that provides much of the texture and flavor in current meat products.

    [Image: TED]

  • $325,000 Burger Is The Future Of Meat Production

    Would you pay $325,000 for a burger? Probably not. It’s hard to get anybody to pay more than a dollar for a burger these days, but one researcher hopes that its $325,000 burger will one day be cheap enough for the mass market.

    The New York Times has a fascinating report on Dr. Post, a researcher that is attempting to make the first in vitro hamburger. In other words, he is growing edible beef in a petri dish. It’s real beef too as it’s grown from actual beef cells collected from cows.

    Dr. Post and his research team at Maastricht University in the Netherlands are almost ready to present the first lab grown burger to the world. It’s comprised of 20,000 strips of lab grown muscle tissue combined together to form a single burger. The cost of those 20,000 strips is the aforementioned $325,000 provided by an anonymous donor with the final result being prepared for an event in London.

    So, why exactly are we creating “fake” meat? There’s beef made from cow that millions around the world enjoy every day, and then there’s soy-based burgers for vegetarians and vegans. What need could in vitro meat possibly fulfill? In short, it’s more of an environmental move as cows meant for slaughter consume untold amounts of grain and water every year. By reducing the amount of cows needed for meat production, we could increase the amount of water and grain that can go to impoverished countries instead.

    It also has the potential to be a healthier alternative to beef cut from a cow. Although, the health benefits may be outright ignored as people come to grips with the idea of eating food that’s grown in a lab. Some would argue that it’s not much different than eating beef from cows that have been injected with artificial growth hormones, but it will take time for consumers to get used to the idea of eating in vitro meat.

    That being said, the meat being prepared by Dr. Post and his team won’t be in supermarkets for quite some time. Somebody this year will get to eat the first lab grown hamburger, but they will have to pay $325,000 for the opportunity. Until that price can be reduced to less than $10 for a pack of eight patties, you’re not going to see meat labeled as lab grown.