Bezos Earth Fund Establishes Sustainable Protein Research Hub at National University of Singapore
The Bezos Earth Fund has announced the establishment of the Bezos Centre for Sustainable Protein at the National University of Singapore (NUS), marking its first initiative of this kind in Asia. The centre, which is backed by a US$30 million grant, will focus on advancing sustainable protein research and the commercial development of alternative proteins in the region. The NUS centre will focus on key areas such as biomass fermentation, …
University of Helsinki Develops “Game-Changing” Cultivated Meat Technology Without Growth Medium Using Stem Cells
Pekka Katajisto of the University of Helsinki’s HiLIFE (Helsinki Institute of Life Science) and his team at the Myocopia project have developed a technology based on stem cell research that they believe would allow the large-scale production of cultivated meat, thus bringing affordable products to the market. The Myocopia researchers argue that cultivating meat in bioreactors relies on expensive growth factors to make the cells grow and differentiate, and these …
USDA’s First Cultivated Meat Center “NICA” Opens Applications for Research Grants
The first US government-funded center for cultivated meat, the USDA’s National Institute of Cellular Agriculture (NICA) at Tufts University, has announced the opening of applications for its Seed Grant Program 2024. Seed-level funding grants of $25,000 or $50,000 will be awarded to support fundamental or applied research in cellular agriculture, precision fermentation, and alternative proteins. Only primary investigators not associated with NICA are eligible to submit proposals. The new projects …
EU-Funded Program “FEASTS” Sets Out to Research Cultivated Meat and Seafood as Future Proteins
The Fostering European Cellular Agriculture for Sustainable Transition Solution (FEASTS), a newly established research program funded by the EU, has launched this January to work on a three-year project on cultivated meat and seafood. The program aims to gather comprehensive, “unbiased” information and technological knowledge about cell-based meat to establish a framework for sustainable production and promote the technology as a future protein production method. FEASTS is a consortium of …
Researchers at Tufts University Want to Reduce the Production Costs of Cultivated Meat
Researchers at Tufts University have made bovine muscle cells produce their own growth signals, eliminating costly ingredients from the production process. Cellular agriculture, the production of meat from cells grown in bioreactors, is making technological leaps that make it a viable option for the food industry. One such leap has now been made at the Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA), led by David Kaplan, Stern Family Professor of …