GCR: Laying the Scientific and Engineering Foundation for Sustainable Cultivated Meat Production

该提案的重点是融合研究，包括科学，工程，经济，可持续性和消费者对养殖肉类生产的接受度。 养殖肉生产是在大规模发酵罐中培养动物肌肉、脂肪和结缔组织细胞（如牛肉、鸡肉、猪肉、火鸡或鱼类）以生产富含蛋白质的肉类产品的过程。它解决了迫切而紧迫的社会问题，即寻找新的潜在途径，为快速增长的全球人口提供营养和满意的饮食，同时保护我们的环境和有限的资源。它需要包括干细胞工程，组织培养，动物和肉类科学，实验过程优化和人工智能，生物化学工程，工业发酵和制造，食品科学与工程，材料科学和生物材料，感官科学，技术经济建模，生命周期分析和消费者科学等学科的深度融合。 该项目的目标是为新兴的养殖肉类行业建立科学和工程基础，解决阻碍商业化的关键科学和工程瓶颈和知识差距，并培训将建立该行业的科学家和工程师。 这样做将开发创造新的可持续蛋白质来源所需的知识，并有可能支持新产业的发展。为了建立这一科学和工程基础，拟议的融合研究将集中在四个具体目标上：1）开发用于干细胞扩增和分化为肌肉和脂肪的有效策略，其维持细胞系稳定性并支持可扩展性，2）建立一种在廉价的、基于植物的、无血清的培养基中生长和分化细胞系的方法，直至中试规模，3）创建生物材料和允许创建三维组织结构的方法，以及4）完成对养殖肉类生产的技术经济分析（TEA）和生命周期分析（LCA）。这些进展不仅将影响养殖肉类行业，而且还将更广泛地促进用于再生医学的干细胞工程，用于器官替代的生物材料和组织工程，用于生物治疗药物生产的大规模哺乳动物细胞培养，用于食品和生物制药生产的植物细胞培养工艺，以及发酵的技术经济和生命周期分析-该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已被认为是值得通过使用基金会的知识产权评估的支持。优点和更广泛的影响审查标准。

This proposal is focused on convergent research that encompasses the science, engineering, economics, sustainability, and consumer acceptance of cultivated meat production. Cultivated meat production is the process of growing animal muscle, fat, and connective tissue cells, such as beef, chicken, pork, turkey or fish, in large-scale fermentors to produce a protein-rich meat product. It addresses the compelling and immediate societal problem of finding new potential routes toward feeding a rapidly growing global population with a nutritious and satisfying diet, while protecting our environment and limited resources. It requires the deep integration of disciplines including stem cell engineering, tissue culture, animal and meat science, experimental process optimization and artificial intelligence, biochemical engineering, industrial fermentation and manufacturing, food science and engineering, materials science and biomaterials, sensory science, techno-economic modeling, life cycle analysis, and consumer science. The project goal is to establish the scientific and engineering foundation for the nascent cultivated meat industry, address critical scientific and engineering bottlenecks and knowledge gaps that inhibit commercialization, and train the scientists and engineers that will build the industry. Doing so will develop knowledge necessary for the creation of new sustainable protein sources and has the potential to support the growth of a new industry.In order to establish this scientific and engineering foundation, the proposed convergent research will focus on four specific aims: 1) develop an efficient strategy for stem cell amplification and differentiation to muscle and fat that maintains cell line stability and supports scalability, 2) establish a process for growing and differentiating cell lines in inexpensive, plant-based, serum-free medium up to pilot scale, 3) create biomaterials and processes that allow the creation of three-dimensional tissue structure, and 4) complete a techno-economic analysis (TEA) and life cycle analysis (LCA) for cultivated meat production. These advances will not only impact the cultivated meat industry, but will also contribute more broadly to stem cell engineering for regenerative medicine, biomaterials and tissue engineering for organ replacement, large-scale mammalian cell culture for biotherapeutics production, plant cell culture processes for food and biopharmaceutical production, and techno-economic and life cycle analyses of fermentation-based bioprocesses.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.