An Australian company recently unveiled a meatball made of lab-grown cultured meat using the genetic sequence from the long-extinct mammoth. The project aims to spark public debate about the innovative technology. Tim Noakesmith, founder of Australian startup Vow, confirmed the meatball as a genuine innovation.
Cultivated meat, also known as cultured or cell-based meat, is produced from animal cells, eliminating the need to kill livestock. Advocates argue that this is not only better for the animals but also for the environment.
Vow used publicly available genetic information from the mammoth, filled in missing parts with genetic data from the African elephant, and inserted it into a sheep cell. Under the right lab conditions, the cells multiplied until there were enough to create the meatball.
Over 100 companies worldwide are working on cultivated meat products, with many of them being startups like Vow. The technology, if widely adopted, could significantly reduce the environmental impact of global meat production. Currently, billions of acres of land are used for agriculture worldwide.
However, don’t expect to see this on dinner plates worldwide just yet. Singapore is currently the only country to have approved cell-based meat for consumption. Vow plans to sell its first product, a cultivated Japanese quail meat, in Singapore later this year.
Noakesmith explains that they want to get people excited about the future of food, exploring options that are unique and potentially better than the meats currently consumed.