Israeli bioengineers developing 1st lab-grown chicken

By i24news

 

Israeli researchers are in the process of developing the first ever lab-grown chicken, just a few short years after the first lab-grown hamburger was debuted.

Chicken – Photo: Khaled Desouki/AFP

The research is being funded by the Modern Agricultural Foundation, a non-profit “working to promote research in the field of cultured meat.”

The foundation’s co-founder, Shir Friedman says she hopes that by the end of 2015, there will be a recipe for how to “culture chicken cells.”

RELATED:

“In the not so distant future we will look back at how we used to raise cows and chickens and put so much effort into getting a small piece of meat,” said Friedman.

Amit Gefen, a bioengineer at Tel Aviv University who is also an expert in tissue engineering, told Reuters that he hopes to produce a whole piece of chicken from a single cell, and allowing that cell to divide and multiply.

The research is spurred by concerns that the growing demand for meat is putting unsustainable pressure on the planet, both through the food required for the animals and the methane gas they produce, which contributes to global warming.

Proponents of test tube meat cite a variety of reasons for why it is worth supporting, from animal welfare to the environment and even public health — lab-created meat theoretically carries no risk of disease and does not need to be treated with antibiotics.

Peta, the animal rights group, has been funding research in the United States and has offered a $1 million (750,000 Euros) prize for the first lab to produce and bring to market in-vitro chicken meat.

But the Israeli researcher foresee raising the lab chicken as more difficult than producing the lab-grown burger.

Once the beef patty was created, it was estimated to be worth $300,000.

Sergey Brin, one of Google’s co-founders, was revealed as one of the financial backers of the project.

He said in a video message at the time: “Sometimes when technology comes along, it has the capability to transform how we view our world. I like to look at technology opportunities. When technology seems like it is on the cusp of viability and if it succeeds there, it can be really transformative for the world.”

 

View original i24news publication at: http://www.i24news.tv/en/news/technology/64195-150313-israeli-researchers-developing-first-lab-grown-chicken