Microbes from Yellowstone National Park could spur lab-grown food innovation

unnamed file
Morning Glory Pool, a hot spring in Yellowstone National Park, is home to diverse populations of microbes that could be used to produce lab-grown food. Image Credit: Alex Berezow

Scientists have long been captivated by a group of microscopic organisms in Yellowstone National Park. The microbes thrive at extreme temperatures and can efficiently multiply with limited resources. The feat has inspired a company called Sustainable Bioproducts, which is replicating the process in a laboratory and eventually, it hopes, at a large scale.

Sustainable Bioproducts said it feeds common components of food such as starches or glycerin to the already high-protein microbes, which then quickly multiply. The resulting protein, like meat or soy, contains the nine amino acids considered essential to the human diet. But the end product wouldn’t necessarily resemble meat. “It could be some things that are more meat-like,” said Thomas Jonas, the company’s chief executive officer. “It can be savory; it can be sweet; it can be liquid; it can be dairy-like.”

….Sustainable Bioproducts hopes to have a product to sell within two years, Jonas said. “These extremophiles learned to be extremely efficient in using their resources,” he said. “They are very relevant at a point in time when humanity already uses tremendous amounts of resources to support the highly inefficient animal-protein model.”

Read full, original article: Do These Tiny Organisms Hold the Key to Lab-Grown Food?

{{ reviewsTotal }}{{ options.labels.singularReviewCountLabel }}
{{ reviewsTotal }}{{ options.labels.pluralReviewCountLabel }}
{{ options.labels.newReviewButton }}
{{ userData.canReview.message }}
screenshot at  pm

Are pesticide residues on food something to worry about?

In 1962, Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring drew attention to pesticides and their possible dangers to humans, birds, mammals and the ...
glp menu logo outlined

Newsletter Subscription

* indicates required
Email Lists
glp menu logo outlined

Get news on human & agricultural genetics and biotechnology delivered to your inbox.