“Supermeat” avoids battles: startup develops chicken meat in the laboratory


“Supermeat” avoids battles
Startup develops chicken meat in the laboratory

Eating chicken without an animal having to die: A startup in Israel is working on a new type of laboratory meat made from animal cells and plant-based nutrient solution. Testers are enthusiastic and the invention could even earn the title “kosher”.

Looks like chicken, tastes like chicken – but is laboratory-grown “meat” without animal suffering. In Israel, too, scientists are currently working on a clean meat product that does not require slaughter and is intended to protect the environment. In the restaurant “The Chicken” in the central city of Ness Ziona, guests can not only try chicken burgers with laboratory meat, but also have a look at the production process.

The production facility of the Israeli startup Supermeat is docked to the bar. The company offers regular test meals to gather feedback from guests on the various products while awaiting official approval for larger scale laboratory meat production. Currently, Supermeat is able to produce “hundreds of kilograms” of laboratory meat every week, as company director Ido Sawir says.

“It was delicious, the taste was great,” says Gilly Kanfi from Tel Aviv, the self-proclaimed “meat fan” signed up for the test meal months ago. “If I hadn’t known, I would have thought it was a regular chicken burger.”

Cells from the hen’s egg

The guests have a view of the production via large windows. In the case of Supermeat, the meat is made from animal cells taken from the fertilized chicken egg, among other things. Connective tissue and muscle cells are also used. They are then enriched with a herbal solution that contains proteins, fat and minerals, among other things. The size of the pieces doubles within hours. Genetic engineering processes are just as little used as antibiotics.

Supermeat hopes for commercial production in the near future in order to continue to conserve resources such as water and to make the product “healthy and clean”. The company also produces animal feed. The startup isn’t the only laboratory tinkering with the meat of the future – a restaurant in Singapore made history in December when it officially sold the first laboratory-grown chicken.

The laboratory meat produced by Supermeat in Israel could ultimately even be called kosher. First and foremost, Sawir wants to improve “food security worldwide”: More and more people have an ever greater need for meat – this is at the expense of the environment and causes animal suffering and disease through industrial farming.

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