Development of scalable animal-free bioprocesses for cultivated meat production

There is an increased need for sustainable, protein rich food sources to support the rapidly growing population. The current agricultural practices to produce meat are unethical and unsustainable as they utilise a high proportion of natural resources (land, water) and moreover are responsible for ~14.5% of the total greenhouse gas emissions. Alternative protein technologies such as cultivated meat can provide a sustainable solution.
Cultivated meat is animal meat that is produced in a bioreactor under controlled conditions from animal cells obtained through a biopsy. Many prototype cultivated meat products are currently grown using materials derived from animals such as foetal bovine serum which requires animal slaughter and is not sustainable. To maximise the positive environmental and animal welfare outcomes of cultivated meat, all animal-derived components should be replaced by sustainable alternatives.
This project aims to develop a sustainable, scalable and animal-free manufacturing process for cultivated meat production. This will be achieved by:
1) expansion and differentiation of porcine mesenchymal stem cells and porcine myoblasts in monolayer;
2) developing scalable processes for expansion and differentiation of these cells in bioreactors;
3) replacing animal-derived components by testing conventional growth factor cocktails, as well as sustainable materials inspired from a) foods, dietary practices and cultures such as plant-based hydrolysates, high protein content flours and powders (e.g meal worm flour, yeast extract, nutritional yeast - vegan replacements, snow fungus powder) and b) fitness practices such as high content protein powders, aminoacids, creatine etc.

This project will result in the development of animal-free media formulations and scalable processes for manufacturing porcine stem cells for cultivated meat. These findings will be beneficial to the entire cultivated meat industry as it will provide solutions to the current challenges that are hindering the commercialisation of these types of products. This project aligns with EPSRC's research areas of manufacturing technologies and process systems.