June 4, 2007

 

Dutch researchers to try producing pork in laboratory

 

 

Researchers from the Netherlands will try to grow pork meat in a laboratory millions without raising and slaughtering animals.

 

Bernard Roelen, a veterinary science professor at Utrecht University, said, the idea is to replace producing meat from livestock through a process that removes the need for animal feed, transport, land use and methane, factors that are damaging to the environment.

 

He added animals produce "many things that you do not eat".

 

Roelen said the experiment, though at its early stages, also aims to feed millions as date from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization show developed nations are seen to consume an average of 43 kilograms per capita of meat this year, posting an increase of two percent annually.

 

Roelen said he is expecting reactions from the lab-grown meat being non-natural but he said the conditions being currently applied to animals from raising to processing are   already "artificial".

 

He stated research is under way in the US, including one experiment funded by US space agency NASA to see whether meat can be grown for astronauts on long space missions.

 

Roelen admitted it will years before meat can be grown in laboratories and eventually hitting supermarket shelves.

 

Roelen and his team have managed to grow only thin layers of cells that bear no resemblance to pork chops.

 

Under the process, researchers first isolate muscle stem cells, which have the ability to grow and multiply into muscle cells. Afterwards, they have stimulated the cells to develop and gave them nutrients and exercise them with electric current to build bulk.

 

After perfecting that process, scientists will then need to figure out how to layer tissues to add more bulk, since meat grown in petri dishes lacks the blood vessels needed to deliver nutrients through thick muscle fibres.

 

Adding fat for flavour is still underway, Roelen said.