ETH Researches Edible Meat From the Lab

(CONNECT) A team of ETH researchers led by Ori Bar-Nur is on the trail of a better burger from the lab. The researchers have succeeded in cultivating thick muscle fibers from bovine cells in the laboratory, ETH Zurich reported in a press release. The technology is based on Bar-Nur's research into the treatment of muscle diseases.

The ETH researchers grow their muscle fibers from bovine precursor cells, known as myoblasts. Three specific molecules were added to the cell culture medium in the Petri dish and then removed from the medium during the process. This is the first time they have succeeded in creating three-dimensional muscle tissue with thick fibers, writes ETH. Previous projects by other researchers using a different method had generally only produced fairly thin fibers. In contrast to these projects, the same genes and proteins are active in the tissue cultivated at ETH as in natural bovine muscle tissue.

Bar-Nur is considering founding a start-up company to further develop the technology towards lab-grown muscle meat. However, there is still a long way to go before farmed meat can reach our plates. "The cell culture medium needs to be further optimized to make it cheaper and safer for human consumption," explains Christine Trautmann, PhD student in Bar-Nur's group and one of the two lead authors of the study. "We also need to research how we can produce these muscle fibers in larger quantities." The researchers' yield so far is only a few grams. ce/hs