Cellular agriculture in the UK: A review [version 1; peer review: 2 approved, 2 approved with reservations]

Neil Stephens; Marianne Ellis

doi:10.12688/wellcomeopenres.15685.1

Cellular agriculture in the UK: A review [version 1; peer review: 2 approved, 2 approved with reservations]

Neil Stephens^*, Marianne Ellis

^*Corresponding author for this work

Social Policy

Research output: Contribution to journal › Review article › peer-review

4 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

This review details the core activity in cellular agriculture conducted in the UK at the end of 2019, based upon a literature review by, and community contacts of the authors. Cellular agriculture is an emergent field in which agricultural products-most typically animal-derived agricultural products-are produced through processes operating at the cellular level, as opposed to (typically farm-based) processes operating at the whole organism level. Figurehead example technologies include meat, leather and milk products manufactured from a cellular level. Cellular agriculture can be divided into two forms: ‘tissue-based cellular agriculture’ and ‘fermentation-based cellular agriculture’. Products under development in this category are typically valued for their environmental, ethical, and sometimes health and safety advantages over the animal-derived versions. There are university laboratories actively pursuing research on meat products through cellular agriculture at the universities of Bath, Newcastle, Aberystwyth, and Aston University in Birmingham. A cellular agriculture approach to producing leather is being pursued at the University of Manchester, and work seeking to produce a palm oil substitute is being conducted at the University of Bath. The UK cellular agriculture companies working in the meat space are Higher Steaks, Cellular Agriculture Ltd, CellulaRevolution, Multus Media and Biomimetic Solutions. UK private investors include CPT Capital, Agronomics Ltd, Atomico, Backed VCs, and Breakoff Capital. The UK also has a strong portfolio of social science research into diverse aspects of cellular agriculture, with at least ten separate projects being pursued over the previous decade. Three analyses of the environmental impact of potential cellular agriculture systems have been conducted in the UK. The first dedicated third-sector group in this sector in the UK is Cultivate (who produced this report) followed by Cellular Agriculture UK. International groups New Harvest and the Good Food Institute also have a UK presence.

Original language	English
Article number	12
Journal	Wellcome Open Research
Volume	5
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.12688/wellcomeopenres.15685.1
Publication status	Published - 2020

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Grant information: NS’s work is supported by a Research Fellowship in Humanities and Social Science from the Wellcome Trust (grant number

Funding Information:
NS’s work is supported by a Research Fellowship in Humanities and Social Science from the Wellcome Trust (grant number WT208198).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Stephens N and Ellis M.

Keywords

Cell-based meat
Cellular agriculture
Clean meat
Cultivated meat
Cultured meat
Palm oil
UK

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Medicine (miscellaneous)
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology(all)

Access to Document

10.12688/wellcomeopenres.15685.1

Cite this

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title = "Cellular agriculture in the UK: A review [version 1; peer review: 2 approved, 2 approved with reservations]",

abstract = "This review details the core activity in cellular agriculture conducted in the UK at the end of 2019, based upon a literature review by, and community contacts of the authors. Cellular agriculture is an emergent field in which agricultural products-most typically animal-derived agricultural products-are produced through processes operating at the cellular level, as opposed to (typically farm-based) processes operating at the whole organism level. Figurehead example technologies include meat, leather and milk products manufactured from a cellular level. Cellular agriculture can be divided into two forms: {\textquoteleft}tissue-based cellular agriculture{\textquoteright} and {\textquoteleft}fermentation-based cellular agriculture{\textquoteright}. Products under development in this category are typically valued for their environmental, ethical, and sometimes health and safety advantages over the animal-derived versions. There are university laboratories actively pursuing research on meat products through cellular agriculture at the universities of Bath, Newcastle, Aberystwyth, and Aston University in Birmingham. A cellular agriculture approach to producing leather is being pursued at the University of Manchester, and work seeking to produce a palm oil substitute is being conducted at the University of Bath. The UK cellular agriculture companies working in the meat space are Higher Steaks, Cellular Agriculture Ltd, CellulaRevolution, Multus Media and Biomimetic Solutions. UK private investors include CPT Capital, Agronomics Ltd, Atomico, Backed VCs, and Breakoff Capital. The UK also has a strong portfolio of social science research into diverse aspects of cellular agriculture, with at least ten separate projects being pursued over the previous decade. Three analyses of the environmental impact of potential cellular agriculture systems have been conducted in the UK. The first dedicated third-sector group in this sector in the UK is Cultivate (who produced this report) followed by Cellular Agriculture UK. International groups New Harvest and the Good Food Institute also have a UK presence.",

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author = "Neil Stephens and Marianne Ellis",

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ER -

Cellular agriculture in the UK: A review [version 1; peer review: 2 approved, 2 approved with reservations]

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

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Cite this