Scientists have succeeded in creating artificial adipose tissue for artificial meat. In this respect informs American Tufts University.
In the last few decades, scientists and technologists have been actively trying to create an artificial meat substitute that would not require killing animals to obtain it. This is done both to meet the demand of vegetarians who reject meat for ethical reasons, and for environmental reasons, because raising animals is associated with greenhouse gas emissions and the cost of large amounts of biomass. One of the most promising ways is to grow meat from cells, which allows you to build a full-fledged muscle tissue structure, but without adipose tissue, such meat turned out to be very tasteless. At the same time, growing fat was a problem, because when the tissue grows, the oxygen center stops flowing to the cells, and creating artificial vessels to bring oxygen in is beyond the capabilities of modern biotechnologists.
John Yuen Jr. and colleagues were able to circumvent this limitation by growing mouse and swine fat cells as flat, two-dimensional layers. These layers were then joined together using alginate extracted from algae. The result was material that looked like real animal fat in appearance, but the scientists subjected it to two more tests. First, they tested the oil’s properties under pressure and found it to be as pressure resistant as its natural counterparts. Second, the authors examined the molecular composition of farmed tallow and found that the fatty acid mix of cultured mouse tallow was different from natural tallow, and cultured lard had a much more “natural” fatty acid profile.
The authors suggest that it is possible to supplement growing fat cells with a variety of lipids to more closely match the fatty acid composition of natural meat.
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