There is a company called Ecovative. It has been a long time and has been producing biomaterials to replace plastics and similar substances for the preservation of the environment. One of the major partners of Ecovative is a world famous manufacturer of furniture and accessories IKEA. For her Ecovative creates environmentally friendly packaging for products, and are used for that particular mushroom. So, it is the technology of packaging with the help of fungi, the firm wants to adapt for the production of artificial meat.
Already a lot of companies around the world took up the production of artificial meat and there are a lot of reasons, but all such projects there is one very significant shortcoming: it is possible to grow muscle cells, or even create a meat analogs based on different technologies, but to repeat the structure of the meat is still extremely difficult (soy meat do not take into account, it is still a purely vegetable product). Thus, any existing artificial meat can be used to create meatballs, sausages, burgers, but for the production of steaks, cuts and fillets it is not appropriate. This is what is going to change Ecovative. Now special mushrooms make original products in environmentally friendly packaging, but, according to the company, it’s easy to “reconfigure” for the production of artificial meat. As stated in an interview with Business Insider co-founder and CEO of Ecovative Eben Bayer,
“For example, if you look at the forest, you will see that the plants are limited by the geometry of the leaves. They are small and thin. Mycelium mycelium we can make the sheet length and a thickness of a few feet. We can control the density. The thing that makes the mycelium is the transition from unicellular substrate to the three-dimensional structure. We can create a “skeleton” which allows the cells to grow meat, fat and forming muscle fibers. We have grown in mycelium cells of animals, and they grow very well. If it works, we can start to produce the first products with the texture and structure of steaks and fillets, but without the slaughter of animals.”
How do you feel about such developments? Have your say in our chat in Telegram.
Artificial meat will be produced from the same “material” and the packaging of goods in IKEA
Vladimir Kuznetsov