GE FOOD Flashcards
Why engineer food, especially meat?
Expected 69% ^ in food calories required in order to feed population by 2050.
Meat is the most valuable livestock product and contains all of the required amino acids and high in vitamins and minerals
Problem with meat production
Meat production responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than all of transport sector, as well as water withdrawal
Large number of animals in small spaces = easier transmission of bacterial diseases = higher bacterial resistance!
NOT SUSTAINABLE
Development of the cultured meat concept –> space?
Long term space missions need adequate food supply –> looked into possibility of people in space being able to grow their own food
2013 publicity stunt –> lab grown burger? What did this show?
Burger grown in culture –> showed that could be viable approach to making lab grown food by FOLLOWING THE MAIN STEPS NEEDED FOR TISSUE ENGINEERING –> cells, biomaterials and scaffolds and bioactive molecules, all put together in a bioreactor.
Skeletal muscle - overall structure ?
Myofibres grouped into muscle fibres. Satellite cells (stem cells) on top of myofibres. Muscle fibres ae bundles together in a fascicle. Many fascicles make up the muscle.
Regeneration and skeletal muscle - problem?
Muscles do not regenerate with huge turnover - when muscle injured satellite cells differentiate into myoblasts. These fuse into myotubes and mature into myofibres. Different trans factors active at each stage
Why would satellite cells be useful in skeletal cell regen?
Can culture them in vitro and expand them in number and into myoblasts.
What must be considered when producing muscle in vitro?
Anchorage – how muscle attaches to bones
Mechanical stimulation
Electrical stimulation
Alternative fabrication strategies –> why are they needed for muscles?
Allow highly organised structure of muscle (therefore meat) –> 3D printing of muscle tissue!!
Technical challenges of food engineering
- development of better cell lines
- development of better nutrient media (feeds cell lines)
- better scaffolding materials to help shape cultured cells into tissues
- choose optimum bioreactor platforms
What are the specifics for food tissue engineering?
- Scale
- Efficiency
- Customer Acceptancy
Scale of tissue engineering - why important?
293 million tonnes per year of food needs to be produced
Would need 1 bioreactor per 10 humans!
Huge amount of culture media would be needed
Efficiency of tissue engineering - what must be considered?
- Optimisation of scale up
- Optimisation of differentiation
Customer acceptance of tissue engineering - what must be considered?
Many customers would be adverse to eating meat grown in the lab - contrary to medical use of TE devices and procedures as not a life or death scenario.
- taste and texture
- ethical implications etc - not harming animals
Importance of marketing for customer acceptance?
Way the product is presented to the public gave better or worse public acceptance – lab grown meat :( ‘clean meat’ :)
