Technology and processes for cultivated meat

Peer reviewed / Manuscript (overview) submitted: 4 September 2024; revision accepted: 9 January 2025

Fundamentals, challenges, and perspectives

Introduction

In the European Union, industrial livestock farming accounts for around 85% of total agricultural CO₂ emissions [1]. In contrast to conventional agriculture, cultivated meat requires significantly less agricultural land, which is particularly important given limited resources [2]. It addresses the fundamental conflict of objectives between food security, environmental preservation, and health, known as the diet-environment-health trilemma. Cultivated meat has the potential to positively influence all three aspects of this trilemma at the same time [2, 3].

The term refers generally to structured tissue produced from animal cells using modern cell cultivation methods. The general approach is to circumvent the ethical and ecological problems of traditional livestock farming without consumers having to forego the consumption of animal proteins and fats [4]. This modern method could fundamentally change the food industry and provide more sustainable and ethical alternatives to conventional meat consumption. Cultivated meat could not only significantly reduce the environmental impact of livestock farming and address the diet-environment- health trilemma but also solve the global problem of animal suffering. In addition, consistent and safe meat production can be ensured by growing animal muscle and fat cells in controlled environments. There is also ongoing research into whether production requires fewer resources while minimizing CO₂ emissions compared to conventional livestock farming. ...

Abstract

Cultivated meat, along with plant-based and insect-based alternatives, as well as proteins and biomass derived from fermentation processes, is considered a potentially sustainable alternative to conventional meat production. This review provides an overview of the concept of cultivated meat production and explains what efforts are currently being made in research and development to establish it as a sustainable and healthy food. The focus is on the current (bio)technological challenges, especially in production. To produce a structured product that resembles animal tissue, the growth of cells on suitable edible and biocompatible scaffold matrices is a prerequisite. In addition to this approach, there are also non-scaffold based methods such as 3D-bioprinting. Regardless of the method chosen, however, scaling up the growth and differentiation processes is crucial to increase the efficiency of the entire process. This article provides an overview of the current state of the art and derives approaches for future research projects, taking sustainability aspects into account.

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