Prototyping and Validating Novel Scalable Biomimetic Bioreactors for Low Carbon Cultivated Meat Production

Global food systems need to produce 50% more food to sustain growing populations over the next 40years, whilst substantially reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with food production and consumption (Social Market Foundation, 2020). According to the Independent Panel on Climate Change, 14% of total GHG emissions are attributable to the world's meat supply, without changes throughout the value chain, food systems emissions are likely to increase by 30-40% by 2050 (IPCC,2020).

Research shows that within a decade Cultivated Meat will reduce 17% GHG for the creation of chicken, reduce by 52% to make pork and reduce by 92% to make beef. It will also reduce land use by 63% for chicken, 72% for pork and 95% for beef (Good Food Institute,2021). While production costs are currently between 100-10,000 times higher than for comparable animal meat products, with the right scale up technologies and prices could reach a competitive point earlier than 2030\. Progress in the industry has been slow but in the last decade cultivated meat has gone form the first lab grown burger costing \>$250,000 in 2013 to cultivated chicken being approved in the USA and sold in Singapore restaurants/markets in 2023\.

Animal Alternative Technologies is an engineering B2B company based in the University of Cambridge. We are creating a scalable, end-to-end ecosystem for Cultivated Meat production, including specialist processes, enabling technologies, software, hardware and raw materials. Our mission is to democratise access to sustainable food and tackle some of the world's biggest sustainability and food security challenges. Our collaboration with the University of Manchester and University of Cambridge during this R&D project aims to develop a novel bioreactor technology that enables meat producers to create their own tailored, cultivated meat products for market at scale. We will do this by developing our novel scaffold and bioreactor system which enables cultivated meat producers to produce a plethora of affordable meat products (starting with lamb and pork), that are scalable, nutritious, delicious, for general consumption, with a lower environmental impact, higher quality meat, stronger local supply chains, and ethically sources.

To date, we have raised over £3million from VCs and strategic investors, and have developed several patents/pioneering technologies, including hydrogels, cell lines, and bioelectronic sensors. Our work has received multiple awards, and AAT has participated in 4 accelerators. We have received coverage from TechCrunch, Food Navigator, The Spoon, etc., and are driven to tackle food security and sustainability challenges.