WEBVTT - Lab-grown meat: Order up! 0:00:01.520 --> 0:00:04.960 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works 0:00:05.000 --> 0:00:14.840 dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:18.520 Clark with me as always as Charles W. Chuck Bryant, 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:24.640 and um this here is stuff you should know the podcast. Welcome, 0:00:25.160 --> 0:00:30.800 bien venue, Bill Coleman. What is that from the producers? 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:36.320 I don't know. Cabaret? Is that from something? Yeah? I 0:00:36.320 --> 0:00:39.239 think maybe cabaret. I've never seen it. I don't know. 0:00:39.280 --> 0:00:42.879 I just just saying welcome in different languages. Um so 0:00:43.040 --> 0:00:45.559 you're feeling good right now. I'm feeling better now that 0:00:45.600 --> 0:00:47.519 we have gotten the Condom podcast out of the way. 0:00:47.520 --> 0:00:51.080 I was a little bit uh sweaty oh yeah during 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:54.959 that one. Got me all worked up. Um So now 0:00:54.960 --> 0:00:57.560 we can talk about lab grown meat. What a great 0:00:57.600 --> 0:01:02.480 one two punch, Jerry just giggling. We are talking lab 0:01:02.520 --> 0:01:05.680 grown meete man. We're talking about possibly the future of 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:10.680 humanity or what the future of humanity will eat. Um. 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:14.560 And this has kind of been a big thing ever 0:01:14.600 --> 0:01:17.880 since two thousand one, which we'll get to a second. 0:01:18.240 --> 0:01:23.160 Let's flash forward by flashing back to two eight when 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.600 Peter the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and 0:01:26.680 --> 0:01:30.000 posted a one million dollar reward to the first researcher 0:01:30.360 --> 0:01:33.360 that could come up with lab grown a K in 0:01:33.520 --> 0:01:38.080 vitro a K a cultured meat that was commercially viable, 0:01:38.120 --> 0:01:41.280 meaning it was for sale and within in ten states 0:01:41.920 --> 0:01:46.959 by June two thousand twelve. That didn't happen. No, it 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:50.280 didn't happen. But Peter is very excited because they said 0:01:50.600 --> 0:01:55.360 that October the first taste test of in vitro hamburger 0:01:55.400 --> 0:01:58.640 took place. And I think we know who that was, 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:01.960 don't we? Was that the man? I believe it was 0:02:02.000 --> 0:02:05.840 a guy named Gabor four Gas. Yeah, that's a funny name, 0:02:05.920 --> 0:02:10.000 but he is one of the leaders in the lab 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.160 grown meat He's basically one of two. Yeah, there is 0:02:14.200 --> 0:02:16.520 a Bill Gates and the Steve Jobs in the in 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:20.240 vitro meat game and Gibor four Ghacks. I take it 0:02:20.320 --> 0:02:23.360 as the Steve Jobs. Yeah. He's from the University of 0:02:23.720 --> 0:02:27.040 Missouri and he's a tissue engineering specialist and he has 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:32.000 a company called Modern Meadows. Great name, it's a It's 0:02:32.200 --> 0:02:34.040 one of the better company names I've heard of in 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:36.760 my life. Yeah, it really fits. It's not too clever, 0:02:37.480 --> 0:02:38.840 you know. I hate the ones that are too like 0:02:39.560 --> 0:02:44.040 not a winkie you know, like robo cow. Yeah, is 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:46.280 that another one? No, I just made it up. Oh see, 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:49.520 that's awful. That's great. I channel my inner John Strickling. 0:02:49.720 --> 0:02:53.840 That's very good. Um, this is I just pictured Strickling 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:55.440 like just sticking his head in the door and saying 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:59.799 a robo cow. Um. So anyway, Modern Meadows is his 0:02:59.840 --> 0:03:03.000 kind company, and their aim is to get this stuff 0:03:03.680 --> 0:03:06.800 tasty enough and cheap enough to make it a viable 0:03:07.520 --> 0:03:10.639 solution for either people who want to eat meat but 0:03:11.160 --> 0:03:15.320 have reasons to not, or to help solve the impending 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:19.079 hunger crisis. Not impending, it's kind of already here right. Uh. 0:03:19.160 --> 0:03:21.760 And apparently it may not have been four gacks. It 0:03:22.040 --> 0:03:24.079 could have been. I don't know, but four Gacks definitely 0:03:24.440 --> 0:03:27.799 did a taste test himself earlier in two In two 0:03:27.840 --> 0:03:31.560 thousand eleven, um, he went to a ted Med conference 0:03:32.000 --> 0:03:34.440 and talked about his synthetic meat and then ate some 0:03:34.600 --> 0:03:37.880 on stage, which is kind of weird because it's like, 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:41.120 but yeah, it's kind of weird. It's like, I mean, 0:03:41.240 --> 0:03:43.560 I guess if you were like hawking hot dogs or something, 0:03:43.560 --> 0:03:46.480 you would eat them in public. So that's not that odd. 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:49.160 And it seems at first blush. It's a little sounds 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:52.160 a little bit of a carnival barker, uh feel to 0:03:52.240 --> 0:03:55.440 that though. They say that every great scientist is one 0:03:55.560 --> 0:03:59.200 part BF Skinner, one part P. T. Barnum. Yeah, well 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:03.560 that's a principal Skinner said, oh yeah on the Simpsons. Yeah, 0:04:04.080 --> 0:04:06.640 that's good. That's good saying though, like it. Yeah, um, 0:04:06.680 --> 0:04:09.000 the other the Bill Gates or was that the Bill Gates? 0:04:09.160 --> 0:04:11.680 I think four Gacks is Steve Jobs. Okay, so the 0:04:11.680 --> 0:04:15.320 Bill Gates is Marquis Post from Night Court from TV's 0:04:15.360 --> 0:04:22.480 Night Court. Oh no, Mark Post from my strict university UM, 0:04:22.520 --> 0:04:24.480 which is in the Netherlands. Right, It's like these two 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:28.520 universities get their researchers swapped. Serious Mark Post is in 0:04:28.560 --> 0:04:31.280 the Netherlands and get more. Four Gas is in the 0:04:31.440 --> 0:04:35.200 University of Missouri. So maybe they did an exchange program 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:41.680 or something. So Post is a vascular physiologist and he 0:04:42.040 --> 0:04:44.880 and they said that they're not competing, no, And if 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:47.000 you look at their their stuff, they're coming up with 0:04:47.040 --> 0:04:50.719 two very different means to the same end eventually. But 0:04:51.440 --> 0:04:53.680 who knows. Maybe they're friends. I would imagine that's a 0:04:53.680 --> 0:04:57.080 pretty small community, the synthetic meat community. Yeah, they're probably 0:04:57.080 --> 0:04:59.760 on each other speed dial, I bet, and they're supposedly 0:04:59.800 --> 0:05:03.640 only about thirty groups working on this right now. But 0:05:03.760 --> 0:05:06.440 what's what's mind boggling is just how much of an 0:05:06.480 --> 0:05:10.360 impact a breakthrough, a real breakthrough. And by breakthrough, it 0:05:10.440 --> 0:05:12.640 was like you were saying four Gas said like, you 0:05:12.680 --> 0:05:15.000 have to get it cheap, and you have to get 0:05:15.000 --> 0:05:17.480 it tasty, and then you have to get the public 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:20.159 to eat it. But how much of a real breakthrough 0:05:20.320 --> 0:05:22.480 that would be. If someone were able to do that, 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:25.680 it would be tremendous, okay, and potentially solve a lot 0:05:25.720 --> 0:05:29.280 of problems that are impending. So this idea is not new, 0:05:29.480 --> 0:05:34.479 the idea of creating lab grown meat. The Churchill thing, Yeah, 0:05:34.760 --> 0:05:37.240 you don't think that's exactly what we're talking about, Oh, 0:05:37.279 --> 0:05:40.800 I guess so. Plus it's Winston Churchill. He's like one 0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:44.239 of the coolest people of all time, that's true. Before 0:05:44.240 --> 0:05:49.160 he was a prime minister, Churchill predicted that quote, we 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:52.919 shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:55.400 order to eat the breast or wing by growing these 0:05:55.440 --> 0:05:59.720 parts separately under a suitable medium. And he was off 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:04.680 roughly by twenty years, you know, and he may have 0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:07.360 meant like mass produced, like we'd be doing that by then. 0:06:07.520 --> 0:06:11.919 Fifty years in two thousand one, twenty years after his prediction, 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:16.640 UM or the deadline of his prediction. UM a guy 0:06:16.839 --> 0:06:21.360 from um to O College. I've never heard of them. 0:06:21.400 --> 0:06:23.760 I don't know New York Toro College t O U 0:06:23.920 --> 0:06:26.560 r oh. I never heard of it either. Well. His 0:06:26.640 --> 0:06:31.159 name is Morris Benjaminson. His dad's name is Benjamin Uh. 0:06:31.240 --> 0:06:34.159 He came up with this idea to take gold fish 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:39.320 goldfish muscle cut fresh out of a live goldfish, which 0:06:39.360 --> 0:06:42.520 is pretty bad for the goldfish, and then thrown into 0:06:42.600 --> 0:06:48.719 a vat of nutrient rich fetal bovine serum, which is Wow. 0:06:48.839 --> 0:06:50.760 I wonder why use goldfish? That's what I don't get. 0:06:50.800 --> 0:06:52.920 Why didn't he use like talapia or something someone might 0:06:52.960 --> 0:06:54.719 want to eat. I don't know. Maybe that was the 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:57.320 only thing that was handy. There was an office gold 0:06:57.760 --> 0:07:01.440 he brought it into his little plastic bag. Wow, and 0:07:01.520 --> 0:07:05.160 instead of eating it live for his fraternity prank, he 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:10.440 grew some more. He actually grew fourteen percent more. Yeah. Um, 0:07:10.480 --> 0:07:14.200 of what was what he put into this fetal bovine serum? 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:18.560 The cells divided, yep, they they were live, which is big, 0:07:18.560 --> 0:07:22.000 but the serum coaxed it and continuing to divide and 0:07:22.240 --> 0:07:25.720 again formed four percent more mass than was originally introduced. 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:28.800 More mass or did you write this, No, this is 0:07:29.240 --> 0:07:32.440 Patrick Kiger, As Patrick puts it, fourteen percent worth of 0:07:32.440 --> 0:07:37.480 additional flesh on the chunks. Yeah, I like your like 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:39.800 mass better than flesh on the chunks. Flesh on the 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:45.800 chunks is good name. Yes. So this guy has this 0:07:45.920 --> 0:07:49.280 bit and he's like, holy cow, it worked, let's eat it. 0:07:50.000 --> 0:07:52.320 So he tried to. He started to fry it up 0:07:52.360 --> 0:07:57.720 with a bit of lemon olive oil and garlic and pepper. Right, yeah, 0:07:57.840 --> 0:08:01.160 it makes great sense, and no one would eat I 0:08:01.160 --> 0:08:03.080 would have tried it. I would have to. Actually, I 0:08:03.120 --> 0:08:04.360 don't know if I would have tried the gold fish, 0:08:04.400 --> 0:08:06.440 if it would have been something else. The goldfish is 0:08:06.480 --> 0:08:39.600 still a big turn off. So his initial thought was 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:42.800 this could be great for astronauts, um, if they could 0:08:42.800 --> 0:08:47.560 eat goldfish or I guess fake meat out in space. 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:52.240 That was his original thought was astronaut used. Isn't that 0:08:52.320 --> 0:08:54.640 what everybody thinks Whenever you think of something made in 0:08:54.679 --> 0:08:57.560 the lab that normally feature produces, it's like, oh, well, 0:08:57.600 --> 0:09:01.160 ask you're not to go bonkers for this. Well, apparently 0:09:01.440 --> 0:09:03.840 Benjamin said had the same idea like you said. But 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.920 as news of this got out, Um Peter and other 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:11.839 animal rights organizations were like, whoa, whoa, wait, what did 0:09:11.880 --> 0:09:16.640 you just do? We are full supporters of this idea, 0:09:17.360 --> 0:09:21.000 because again People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the 0:09:21.040 --> 0:09:24.960 American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. When 0:09:25.000 --> 0:09:28.840 you eat a steak, when you eat um, pork or 0:09:28.960 --> 0:09:35.040 bacon or ham, all these things come from an animals, 0:09:35.160 --> 0:09:39.160 often lovable animal, but people still like to eat them. 0:09:39.320 --> 0:09:42.200 People still get nutrients from So if you take the 0:09:42.240 --> 0:09:47.040 idea that an animal, a live, sentient animal, suffered and 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:52.680 died so that you could eat it and still eat it, man, 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:56.000 that's like, that's the bonanza right there, for at least 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:58.480 for people who object to eating meat for out of 0:09:59.040 --> 0:10:02.920 cruelty and still want to eat meat objecting on the 0:10:02.920 --> 0:10:06.800 grounds of cruelty to write to eating me um. In 0:10:06.800 --> 0:10:09.560 two thousand eight in Norway, they had a conference first 0:10:09.559 --> 0:10:12.839 time ever on test duo meat, and they released a 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:16.719 study saying, you know what, we could potentially manufacture the 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:19.760 stuff for five thousand dollars a ton which would make 0:10:19.800 --> 0:10:24.319 it competitive on an economic basis with real meat, um 0:10:24.440 --> 0:10:27.720 by which is right now, they're about thirty different research 0:10:27.760 --> 0:10:30.760 teams working on this. But like we said, I get 0:10:30.760 --> 0:10:34.480 the feeling that post in igor what was his name, 0:10:34.920 --> 0:10:40.079 good boar good four gags are definitely the leting edge. Um. 0:10:40.120 --> 0:10:42.319 And I did a little calculating here, Chuck, if if 0:10:42.360 --> 0:10:45.000 you don't mind, I found how much it cost in 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:48.400 Illinois in two thousand seven to raise a pound of 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:56.199 beef and it was something like sixty five cents a pound, right, which, Um, 0:10:56.280 --> 0:10:59.360 that's how much it costs to raise it right about now, 0:10:59.400 --> 0:11:03.560 it's about eight a pound for ground beef retail. That's 0:11:03.600 --> 0:11:07.360 like a markup of like four point five times for 0:11:07.440 --> 0:11:11.000 chuck or for or are we just talking? I'm just okay, yeah, 0:11:11.760 --> 0:11:14.280 I'm just this is just rough back of the envelope 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:18.200 kind of stuff. Um. If if you took that five 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:25.080 thousand dollars a ton um in vitro meat figure and 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:27.480 that's how much a custom manufacturer, and then also did 0:11:27.520 --> 0:11:29.920 that same four point five time mark up, you come 0:11:29.920 --> 0:11:34.720 to about eleven dollars a pound, which is pretty competitive. Yeah, 0:11:34.760 --> 0:11:37.040 because I mean think about it, you're paying that much 0:11:37.080 --> 0:11:42.199 for filet, right. Uh, well, yeah, if this were marketed correctly, 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:45.440 it would seem even cooler than filet, and people see 0:11:45.520 --> 0:11:47.160 it tasted kid. Yeah, And people pay a lot of 0:11:47.160 --> 0:11:50.280 money for Kobe beef most times are not even getting 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:53.240 kobe beef. You know about that whole thing, right, It's 0:11:53.320 --> 0:11:55.480 it's a big a lot of times it's a big scam. 0:11:55.600 --> 0:11:58.320 I could see that because I mean, who knows, there's 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:01.319 probably a handful of people in the world could differentiate 0:12:01.360 --> 0:12:04.120 the taste of kobe beef from other beef. Yeah, exactly, 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:07.440 even like really renowned restaurants are serving what they call 0:12:07.559 --> 0:12:09.200 Kobe beef for a lot of money. It's not kobeb 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:12.720 is messed up. It is messed up. That's like a lobster. Lobster, 0:12:12.880 --> 0:12:15.760 the price of lobster is like in the basement right 0:12:15.760 --> 0:12:18.640 now in restaurants are still charging as much as ever 0:12:19.040 --> 0:12:22.200 for it and making tons of money, and but the 0:12:22.240 --> 0:12:24.160 lobster men are just getting like the short end of 0:12:24.200 --> 0:12:26.960 the stick because there's a huge supply of them right now. Yeah, 0:12:26.960 --> 0:12:28.679 but in lobster, one of those where they usually don't 0:12:28.720 --> 0:12:31.200 say market price on the menu, isn't usually like just 0:12:31.480 --> 0:12:35.120 straight up whatever it'll say market price even if it does, 0:12:35.240 --> 0:12:37.800 and they're still charging you a bunch like what market 0:12:37.800 --> 0:12:40.400 price used to be when the price of lobster actually 0:12:40.440 --> 0:12:42.120 was high. I wonder if you could come in with 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:44.160 some numbers and say no, no no, no, that's not market price. 0:12:44.520 --> 0:12:47.960 Apparently you can argue with just about anybody really. Yeah, 0:12:48.000 --> 0:12:51.040 and and often when you know, our buddy Julie was 0:12:51.080 --> 0:12:54.600 in Maine. She vacations in Maine some and she said 0:12:54.640 --> 0:12:58.120 they're like given her lobsters on her last trip, like 0:12:58.400 --> 0:13:00.400 here's twenty lobsters, Like we don't want them to go 0:13:00.440 --> 0:13:04.200 to waste, Julie of stuff. Blow your mind, no, Julie 0:13:04.440 --> 0:13:10.520 Smith O okay yeah our producer, Yeah you have TV um. Yes, 0:13:10.840 --> 0:13:14.839 it's because there's like a huge boom in the lobster population. Yeah. Man, 0:13:14.880 --> 0:13:17.439 I love a lobster roll. Boy. We got really off 0:13:17.480 --> 0:13:20.800 track here, all right, see a little there's synthetic lobster. 0:13:21.480 --> 0:13:26.920 It's actually cod right. Oh, the that's imitation crab meat. Yeah, 0:13:27.160 --> 0:13:32.959 that's not synthetic though, it's imitation. Yeah, imitation, big difference. Alright. 0:13:33.000 --> 0:13:36.880 So um, the Dutch team headed by Marquis Posts, they 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:41.040 are using cow stem cells to create this meat, So 0:13:41.120 --> 0:13:44.400 they culture the stem cell little petrie dishes, put it 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:48.720 in a small container um to produce muscle cells. Sounds 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:52.559 kind of gross, and they form little small pieces of 0:13:52.600 --> 0:13:56.600 muscle about two centimeters long, centimeter wide, and a millimeter thick. 0:13:57.200 --> 0:13:59.000 And they say that it looks a little more like 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:02.400 calamari than any kind of a hamburger. And the taste 0:14:02.440 --> 0:14:05.040 initially is pretty bland, right, And the reason the taste 0:14:05.120 --> 0:14:08.360 is bland is because it's missing a lot of essential 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:15.000 ingredients to meat, like blood blood uh, fat, blood veins, 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:17.400 and it's such as muscle cells. But muscle fibers are 0:14:17.440 --> 0:14:20.040 you're eating? And do you know that it was only 0:14:20.080 --> 0:14:23.080 within the last couple of months that I realized meat 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:27.760 steak is muscle mass. That told me that you were 0:14:27.760 --> 0:14:29.080 shocked back then, And I was like, what do you 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:31.080 think it was? I I hadn't really thought of it. 0:14:31.120 --> 0:14:33.280 I thought it was its own thing, like there's fat 0:14:33.440 --> 0:14:37.240 muscle meat and then steak. Yeah, like that's really what 0:14:37.320 --> 0:14:40.000 I thought. And then I suddenly just I don't know 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:42.440 why I was thinking about it. I think I wanted 0:14:42.480 --> 0:14:44.040 a steak, so I was thinking about a steak, and 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:46.400 I thought too hard and all of a sudden realized 0:14:46.440 --> 0:14:49.760 what a steak was. Um. But yeah, so it's but 0:14:49.840 --> 0:14:52.960 it's not just this muscle, it's muscle fibers, it's fat, 0:14:53.040 --> 0:14:56.000 it's blood. It's like all this stuff comes together and 0:14:56.040 --> 0:14:59.240 they're gonna have to really lick that before they can 0:14:59.400 --> 0:15:02.560 make the stuff commercially viable. Absolutely. Um. One of the 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:06.360 ideas that modern meadows using is to use a three 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:10.800 D printer to spray what they call bio inc which 0:15:10.840 --> 0:15:13.840 is muscle cells and stuff like that to build up 0:15:14.840 --> 0:15:17.320 you know, they like spray many layers of the stuff 0:15:17.320 --> 0:15:19.760 to build it up into like more viable meat option, 0:15:19.840 --> 0:15:23.320 which is pretty cool. Three D printers pretty awesome to 0:15:23.400 --> 0:15:27.200 hear about Japan's photo booth. They're opening the world's first 0:15:27.240 --> 0:15:29.640 three D printing photo booth. So you go in and 0:15:29.680 --> 0:15:31.720 you come out with like a little statue of you 0:15:31.840 --> 0:15:35.960 or you and your your lady and yeah, yeah, I 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:39.280 would do that totally. One that cost I don't know, 0:15:39.360 --> 0:15:43.040 but I would guess a lot. It's sort of like 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:46.560 in vitro meat. All right, So what are the other 0:15:46.600 --> 0:15:49.560 hurdles here? Um, it's tricky, Like you said, it's it's 0:15:49.600 --> 0:15:52.920 a a mix of fuel and salt, and minerals and hormones, 0:15:53.360 --> 0:15:56.240 and this is just to grow the cells that are 0:15:56.280 --> 0:15:59.520 healthy enough to survive. Like that's not even talking about 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:03.560 getting it to look like a steak or a hamburger patty, 0:16:03.600 --> 0:16:05.880 because like you said, it's not just you know, it's 0:16:05.960 --> 0:16:11.120 very complex a group of stuff in there. It's not 0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:14.560 just like muscle and that's it. And uh, it's extremely 0:16:14.600 --> 0:16:17.800 expensive right now. I think we were kind of touched upon. 0:16:17.880 --> 0:16:21.920 But Mark Posts said that his his hamburger, the first 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:25.160 one that he would ever make, would cost about grande. 0:16:25.640 --> 0:16:27.680 But he's looking for a celebrity chef to cook it. 0:16:27.880 --> 0:16:32.800 Kind of drum up business and gabor Um fo gas right, 0:16:32.920 --> 0:16:35.640 that's his last name, four gack four gack um. He 0:16:35.680 --> 0:16:39.560 was saying his Modern Meadows stuff would be between umt 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:42.480 a d eighty bucks a pound, right, which like you said, 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:47.080 is competitive with Kobe. Yeah, and and that's four Gaxs 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:50.240 sees this as he I don't think he sees it 0:16:50.240 --> 0:16:52.760 as like, hey, this is gonna be the everyday solution. 0:16:53.080 --> 0:16:56.480 He sees it as a niche industry. Um. He also 0:16:56.520 --> 0:16:59.320 said that his first product is more likely going to 0:16:59.400 --> 0:17:02.440 be leather because it's not as regulated and it's a 0:17:02.480 --> 0:17:07.520 little easier to accept us for the public at large. Um. 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:10.760 He also was saying that as far as creating food goes, 0:17:10.800 --> 0:17:13.919 like we are imaginations immediately jumped to building a steak, 0:17:14.080 --> 0:17:17.080 building a hamburger, building like a pork chop or something 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:20.720 like that. Right. He was saying, probably the first stuff 0:17:20.760 --> 0:17:23.520 that we're gonna see is gonna be like flower And 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:25.600 he pointed out in this one CNN article we read 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:28.400 like you don't eat flour for flowers and like everything 0:17:28.720 --> 0:17:31.640 that you eat. Um. And he was saying, like, this 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:37.160 will be stuff to create meatballs with or pete. It's like, 0:17:37.640 --> 0:17:40.720 instead of taking a chicken and chopping it up and 0:17:40.720 --> 0:17:43.879 then using it in that pett a, you would, you know, 0:17:44.200 --> 0:17:47.280 use it although more as an ingredient rather than like 0:17:47.640 --> 0:17:50.440 the steak on the plate. Exactly, at least for now 0:17:51.640 --> 0:17:55.080 makes sense. Um. This could potentially be a great thing 0:17:55.200 --> 0:17:59.199 for many reasons, uh, one of which is uh not, 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:02.720 the least of which is that lab grown meat would 0:18:03.000 --> 0:18:09.920 have about seventy eight for your greenhouse gasses less land obviously, 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:14.520 eighty two to ninety six percent less water, and eight 0:18:14.760 --> 0:18:17.400 percent of the world's greenhouse emissions come from the livestock 0:18:17.440 --> 0:18:20.760 sector right now. And you know from what well, gas 0:18:20.760 --> 0:18:26.719 and and gas, yeah, two types of gas. Yeah, like 0:18:26.880 --> 0:18:30.800 have a methane problem from cow poop and gas and 0:18:30.800 --> 0:18:32.760 then all the gas used to you know, obviously take 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:35.800 care of the industry. And plus it's also just a 0:18:35.840 --> 0:18:39.080 lot more energy efficient. We use a hundred grams of 0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:42.919 grain to produce fifteen grams of meat. That's a fifteen 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:45.239 percent efficiency, because what are you doing, chuck, when you 0:18:45.280 --> 0:18:50.520 like feed something something, right, you take um, you take 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:53.359 the energy found in a plant and feed it to 0:18:53.400 --> 0:18:58.560 an animals's energy transfer, but you lose apparently you're thinking um, 0:18:58.600 --> 0:19:00.720 with lab grown meat, the energy fficiency will be like, 0:19:02.119 --> 0:19:04.880 that's awesome. And some of the other costs. To grow 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:10.680 a pound of beef regular beef necessitatesallons of water, twelve 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:13.520 pounds of grain, thirty five pounds of top soil, and 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:16.639 the equivalent energy wise of one gallon of gas to 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:19.959 grow a pound of meat just one pound of ground beef. Right, 0:19:20.000 --> 0:19:22.240 So you've got a lot of people abstinding for meeting 0:19:22.240 --> 0:19:25.760 meat because of the animal cruelty aspect um. You have 0:19:25.800 --> 0:19:28.520 a lot of people saying it's just socially irresponsible to 0:19:28.600 --> 0:19:34.120 eat meat um, and then you have people who, um, well, 0:19:34.160 --> 0:19:35.960 I guess that's it, right, that's the only reason people 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:39.960 don't eat me. Uh yeah, well people like my wife 0:19:40.000 --> 0:19:42.080 who don't like the taste. Okay, well this is not 0:19:42.119 --> 0:19:44.719 gonna appeal to hur at all. They're no, no, no, um. 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:48.560 But you were saying like that these this the environment 0:19:48.680 --> 0:19:51.840 or ecological consumption that it takes to create a pound 0:19:51.880 --> 0:19:55.200 of meat. Apparently they think that meat production is going 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:59.440 to have to um double in the next forty years 0:19:59.480 --> 0:20:02.680 because of increasing incomes around the world. Typically, when your 0:20:03.040 --> 0:20:05.960 GDP goes up, your consumption of meat goes through the roof, 0:20:06.600 --> 0:20:09.119 and China and India are on the way up, and 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:13.119 they're thinking that meat is going to get in higher demand. 0:20:14.920 --> 0:20:17.240 Not enough land, Like right now, I think it said 0:20:17.280 --> 0:20:20.280 seventy of dry land on the earth is used for 0:20:20.640 --> 0:20:27.399 either grazing or some factor of livestock. So like, what 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:30.160 are you gonna do there's not that much more land 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:32.480 left to just use for cattle. Well, what they would 0:20:32.480 --> 0:20:34.600 do is the price of meat would just go up 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:36.320 and up and up. Yeah, it would just become more scarce. 0:20:36.359 --> 0:20:39.399 I guess yeah, until this is but as the price 0:20:39.440 --> 0:20:44.720 of meat rises the economic sensibility of lab grown meat 0:20:45.040 --> 0:20:49.760 will become more viable. Yeah, you know, because I mean, 0:20:49.880 --> 0:20:51.840 right now, one of the things that's so cost prohibitive, 0:20:51.880 --> 0:20:53.879 aside from the fact that it looks like calamari and 0:20:53.920 --> 0:20:56.680 it tastes plan Yeah, they said it potentially could be 0:20:56.760 --> 0:21:01.120 healthier to UM. Jason Matheni, director of New Harvest. It's 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:05.280 a nonprofit research org, and they said that it would 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:07.800 have health advantages like UM because it's easier to control 0:21:07.800 --> 0:21:12.000 pathogens and a lab and fat content could be systematically controlled, 0:21:12.359 --> 0:21:15.080 making it healthier. Like we're gonna put this layer of 0:21:15.080 --> 0:21:17.399 fat in with our three D printer because you need 0:21:17.440 --> 0:21:19.360 the fat. That's where the lot of flavor comes from. 0:21:19.480 --> 0:21:22.200 Definitely gotta have fat. And then you just got to 0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:25.840 convince people once it gets cheap enough and tasty enough. 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:30.000 Like you said, the third hurdle is like eat fake 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:33.080 meat people, right, you'll like it, trust me. I think 0:21:33.119 --> 0:21:36.320 the big lesson is to not call it something like 0:21:36.400 --> 0:21:42.240 soil and green modern meadows is perfect. Yeah. I wonder 0:21:42.280 --> 0:21:45.840 what posts the name of his group is. I didn't see, 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:48.679 did you. I don't know. I would taste this just 0:21:49.160 --> 0:21:51.359 you know, if they I wouldn't pay three dollars for 0:21:51.400 --> 0:21:53.920 a hamburger. But um, I would taste it just to 0:21:53.960 --> 0:21:57.520 see what it tasted like. But I don't know. It 0:21:57.560 --> 0:22:00.560 sounds kind of gross to me. I would would try it. 0:22:00.600 --> 0:22:02.320 But a lot of people say that eating meat is 0:22:02.320 --> 0:22:05.600 gross this year. So before you send in those emails, 0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:09.200 let me cut you off. I understand that. Good, go 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:38.040 and chock. Uh. If you want to learn more about 0:22:38.080 --> 0:22:39.760 lab grown meat or any kind of things like that, 0:22:39.800 --> 0:22:42.800 you should check out the innovations channel on how Stuff Works. 0:22:42.840 --> 0:22:46.880 It's pretty awesome. UM, go to how stuff Works homepage 0:22:47.320 --> 0:22:52.639 and you will see in the top navigation bar Innovations 0:22:52.720 --> 0:22:54.679 is one of the channels that we have. Click on that, 0:22:55.800 --> 0:22:57.480 or you can just search for lab grown meat in 0:22:57.480 --> 0:22:59.920 the handy search bar how stuff works And I said 0:23:00.000 --> 0:23:01.800 andy search part, which means it's time for listener mail, 0:23:03.359 --> 0:23:07.240 Josh and Canna call this mentor ship email. UM, Hi guys, 0:23:07.240 --> 0:23:09.359 my name is Colin, and I've been listening to you 0:23:09.400 --> 0:23:12.880 guys since the Viking episode. I've never really been diligent 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:15.520 with emails, but I always wanted to write in. I'm 0:23:15.560 --> 0:23:17.200 in my senior year of high school and involved in 0:23:17.240 --> 0:23:20.760 a class called Independent Study mentorship. This program works like 0:23:20.800 --> 0:23:23.840 an internship for high school students. We're responsible for finding 0:23:23.840 --> 0:23:27.400 a mentor in which ever career field we are interested in. 0:23:27.760 --> 0:23:30.320 We do hands on work with our mentors, and throughout 0:23:30.359 --> 0:23:32.480 the year we compile a portfolio that will eventually be 0:23:32.520 --> 0:23:36.840 a binder filled not with women, but with everything we 0:23:36.880 --> 0:23:40.000 take part in and research throughout the year. It will 0:23:40.080 --> 0:23:42.400 end up about as thick as a good sized dictionary 0:23:42.480 --> 0:23:44.879 or two. My whole reason for writing you, guys is 0:23:44.960 --> 0:23:47.240 to thank you for doing the podcast. I've been able 0:23:47.280 --> 0:23:50.639 to get by without research for about a dozen or 0:23:50.680 --> 0:23:53.639 so topics for essays and projects because you guys usually 0:23:53.640 --> 0:23:57.280 cover far more than my school curriculum does. Um. I've 0:23:57.320 --> 0:24:01.000 even been moved up to several advanced classes. Wow, thanks 0:24:01.040 --> 0:24:03.320 to you. Keep on doing what you're doing. It's great. 0:24:03.320 --> 0:24:04.520 And if I happen to get a mention at the 0:24:04.560 --> 0:24:08.560 end of an episode, I'd be pleasantly surprised. I've always 0:24:08.600 --> 0:24:11.159 kind of wanted to mention. Here you go, Colin. That's 0:24:11.160 --> 0:24:13.160