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Synthetic meat made from animal cells will transform how we eat. It will reduce suffering by eliminating the need to raise and slaughter animals. But it will also have big public health benefits if it becomes widely consumed. In this paper, we discuss how "clean meat" can reduce the risks associated with intensive animal farming, including antibiotic resistance, environmental pollution, and zoonotic viral diseases like influenza and coronavirus. Since the most common objection to clean meat is that some people find it "disgusting" or "unnatural," we explore the psychology of disgust to find possible counter-measures. We argue that the public health benefits of clean meat give us strong moral reasons to promote its development and consumption in a way that the public is likely to support. We end by depicting the change from farmed animals to clean meat as a collective action problem and suggest that social norms rather than coercive laws should be employed to solve the problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To investigate the influence of food culture on the acceptability of meat substitutes, in 2023 we conducted a questionnaire survey on men and women aged 18–69 years (N = 1681) in Japan, a country with a food culture that regards soya as a meat substitute, focusing on 'meaning' in the theory of practice. Analysis of three groups—a flexible group who accept foods processed from soya as meat, a strict group who do not accept such foods as meat, and an intermediate group—showed that the flexible group tended to be more positive about the consumption of meat substitutes than the other groups. However, the flexible group was not simply more accepting, as they expressed aversion and anxiety in response to other questions. Food culture, i.e., what is understood to be meat, influences the acceptability of alternative meats. When examining the social acceptability of meat alternatives in the future, it is also important to look at social practices and historical and cultural backgrounds in a multilayered way, in addition to factors that have been emphasized in previous studies, such as consumers' decision-making process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

IntroductionFood neophobia (FN) is a psychological trait that inhibits one’s willingness to eat unfamiliar foods. It is related to the acceptance of insect foods and cultured meat, which are major protein alternatives to conventional meat, and is an important personality trait for understanding the near-future food industry. However, the factor structure of Pliner and Hobden’s FN scale (FNS) is unstable due to respondents’ cultural backgrounds. Thus, we aimed to develop a Japanese version based on the alternative FNS (FNS-A), the most recent revised version, and to examine its validity.MethodsFour online surveys (preliminary 1: n = 202; preliminary 2: n = 207; main: n = 1,079; follow-up: n = 500) were conducted on the FNS-A. For the main survey, Japanese respondents (aged 20–69 years) answered the Japanese version of the FNS-A (J-FNS-A), their willingness to eat (WTE), and their familiarity with hamburgers containing regular protein foods (ground beef, tofu) and alternative protein foods (soy meat, cultured meat, cricket powder, algae powder, and mealworm powder).ResultsConsistent with the FNS-A, confirmatory factor analysis assuming a two-dimensional structure (approach and avoidance) showed satisfactory model fit indices. The mean J-FNS-A score (Cronbach’s α for 8 items = 0.83) was 4.15 [standard deviation (SD) = 0.93]. J-FNS-A scores were not associated with age and gender, whereas a greater than moderate association was found with WTE hamburgers containing alternative protein foods (rs = −0.42 to −0.33). The strength of these negative associations increased as food familiarity decreased (r = 0.94). The test–retest reliability at 1 month was also satisfactory (r = 0.79).DiscussionThe validity of the J-FNS-A was confirmed. Higher J-FNS-A scores (mean = 41.51, SD = 9.25, converted to Pliner and Hobden’s FNS score) of the respondents suggest that Japanese people prefer conservative foods. This scale could predict the negative attitudes toward foods with low familiarity, such as alternative proteins. The J-FNS-A appears to be a useful psychological tool for assessing Japanese food neophobia tendencies and predicting novel food choices of Japanese individuals.

Certain companies in the rapidly expanding cultured meat space claim that cultured meat is exactly the same in taste, flavour and nutrition as traditional meat, but without the need for animal slaughter, and bringing benefits for human health and the environment. It is important to point out that cultured meat is still in the early phases of development and, in many cases, the claims are based on assumptions rather than facts. In this work, we outline several knowledge gaps, mainly based on technical issues, with repercussions related to the possible benefits as well as economic and regulatory challenges.

Certain companies in the rapidly expanding cultured meat space claim that cultured meat is exactly the same in taste, flavour and nutrition as traditional meat, but without the need for animal slaughter, and bringing benefits for human health and the environment. It is important to point out that cultured meat is still in the early phases of development and, in many cases, the claims are based on assumptions rather than facts. In this work, we outline several knowledge gaps, mainly based on technical issues, with repercussions related to the possible benefits as well as economic and regulatory challenges. Cultured meat made entirely of cultured cells does not yet exist Cultured meat production still faces several hurdles including the omission of animal-derived components and economic viability A lack of transparent production methods limits the evaluation of product characteristics and environmental impact [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence suggests that consumer perceptions and acceptance of cultivated meat (CM) differ between countries, cultures, and consumer groups. Limited research specific to Aotearoa New Zealand (A-NZ) is available. Survey responses from 592 A-NZ residents were analysed to determine CM awareness, willingness to engage with CM, and perceived CM product attributes relative to conventional meat and plant-based meat alternatives (PBMAs). The effects of gender, age, meat/PBMA consumption frequency, CM awareness, and food neophobia on CM perceptions were determined. The statements were rated on a seven-point Likert scale. Half (52%) of the respondents agreed they were aware of CM. The awareness was higher in men compared to women (p = 0.036), higher in Millennials compared to Generation X (p = 0.022), and higher in regular compared to infrequent PBMA consumers (p = 0.0003). The willingness to engage with CM and perceived CM product attributes were consistently more positive in consumers who were aware, compared with consumers not aware of CM (p < 0.05). Being male, Millennial, low neophobic and a low meat, or high PBMA consumer was also associated with higher potential engagement and perceptions of CM to varying extents. Segmentation divided the respondents into three groups. The 'positive' cluster (41%) consumed more PBMAs and less meat and was more aware of CM than the 'neutral' (50%) and 'negative' (9%) clusters. In conclusion, consumers in A-NZ are not a homogenous group with regards to their perceptions and potential engagement with CM. Increasing awareness and familiarity with CM will be an important strategy to increase engagement with CM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This perspective article briefly explores the social implications of cellular agriculture from a Vegan Queer Ecofeminist point of view by referring to a synthesis of currently agreed-upon (possible) positive and negative effects of post-animal agriculture and highlighting how these effects actually ignore key ethical problems inherent in animal agriculture itself. By invisibilizing these, discussions of cellular-ag remain in danger of obscuring the ways in which an intact and unexamined paradigm based on capitalist, patriarchal speciesism will continue to foment exploitative and unjust practices in a dying planet. The article emphasizes the urgent need to address the complexities of cellular-ag from a multidisciplinary perspective that actively engages with the demands of true global justice for all, nonhuman and human.

Meat is traditionally obtained by sacrificing the animals. It is considered as one of the richest sources of proteins. There is an increasing demand for meat worldwide. It may not be possible to fulfill this demand for meat in future. Therefore, there is an urgent need to find out the alternative resources for proteins requirement shortly. Clean meat production is one of the best methods to be adopted as an alternative to traditional meat. The word 'clean' signifies that we can procure meat from animals without its monstrous slaughtering. Hence, it is prepared by isolating a single cell and culturing them in controlled growth conditions and medium that mimic the in vivo condition. It is not a brand new technology, but the tools for developing clean meat that mimics real meat have been technologically advanced recently. Many companies have marketed clean meat products worldwide from last five years. And it has been observed that there are mixed responses for its acceptance by consumers. The main driving forces for clean meat production derives from the concerns over environment, animal welfare, public and consumer health aspects of animal production, use of antibiotics in the animal industries, and food security. Since it's an upcoming meat production technology, there are many hurdles and challenges like nutritional attributes, flavor, shape, and structure compared to real meat. It requires many skills and understanding of muscle stem cells' regeneration and their growth under optimized scale-up production conditions. In this paper the complete details about clean meat, types of cells, and techniques used for its production has been discussed on a lab scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this research was to identify, through a systematic review of the literature, the strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities of the production and commercialization of cultured meat, as well as to analyze the challenges to be faced by this new food biotechnology. For this, we analyzed 194 manuscripts published in the Scopus and Web of Science databases that dealt with cultured meat under the perspective of cellular agriculture, employing several nomenclatures. The results indicate that there is still no consensus in the literature about the strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities of cultured meat, which constitutes an emerging, multifaceted, and encouraging field of study, and a series of inferences have been made that provide insights into the knowledge analyzed. Finally, we propose an analytical model that combines sub-scenarios from which it becomes possible to understand and anticipate the direction of this new food biotechnology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid development of technologies for cultured meat production has led to new challenges for producers regarding appropriate communication with future customers in order to deliver products to a viable market. Communication analysis of social media enables the identification of the key characteristics of the monitored topic, as well as the main areas of communication by individual users based on active digital footprints. This study aimed to identify the key characteristics of cultured meat based on communication analysis of the social network Twitter. Communication analysis was performed based on 36,356 Tweets posted by 4128 individual users. This analysis identified the following main communicated characteristics: clean meat, future meat, and sustainable meat. Latent Dittrich allocation identified five communication topics: (1) clean and sustainable products, (2) comparisons with plant-based protein and the impact on agribusiness, (3) positive environmental aspects, (4) cultured meat as an alternative protein, and (5) the regulation of cultured meat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultured meat (also referred to as cultivated, cell-based, or cell-cultured meat) is a novel food technology that is presented as a method of meat production without reliance on large-scale industrial farming. The pro-cultured meat narrative rests, in part, on a moral foundation: cultured meat is purported to alleviate the environmental and animal welfare harms associated with farmed meat. Despite this narrative, no research has examined which moral values underpin attitudes towards cultured meat. To examine this, we surveyed 1861 participants from the United States and Germany about their moral foundations and their attitudes towards cultured meat. In line with predictions, people who more strongly endorse moral values about purity (i.e., had higher scores on the purity subscale of the moral foundations scale) held more negative attitudes towards cultured meat. However, this relationship was much more consistent among participants from the United States than participants from Germany. Against predictions, attitudes towards cultured meat were not reliably associated with the extent to which people focus on harm as a moral foundation. The latter finding was particularly surprising in light of harm-reduction narratives around cultured meat. These findings demonstrate the need for a more nuanced discussion about, and understanding of, consumer concerns around cultured meat and the values that underpin them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Plant-based meat alternatives were preferred over cultured meat and insect-based products. • Perceived un-naturalness of meat alternatives was the main barrier to consumption intent. • Ethnicity and gender have a notable impact on consumer attitudes towards meat alternatives. • Those with concerns about drug residues in meat were more willing to pay more for meat alternatives. • Differential strategies may be needed to promote acceptance of different meat alternatives. Alternative protein foods can be manufactured from various sources, including plants, insects, and cultured meat. Asia is a unique consumer market, with diverse ethnicities and culinary traditions that may impact consumer acceptance of these emerging protein products. Yet, few studies have compared various alternative protein foods within a multi-ethnic Asian population. We examined how sociodemographic factors were associated with alternative protein food acceptance and investigated the attitudes of individuals towards consuming plant-based meat alternatives, cultured meat, and insect-based products. Adult Singaporeans (n = 1224) from the Multi-Ethnic Cohort 2 study (75 % Chinese, 15 % Indian, 10 % Malay) were surveyed. Hierarchical ordinal regression was used to identify the sociodemographic and attitudinal factors of consumption intent and price sensitivity. Consumption intent for plant-based meat alternatives was the highest, followed by cultured meat, and insect-based products. The perception of un-naturalness was the strongest barrier to consumption intent and this perception was strongest for cultured meat, followed by insect-based products, and plant-based meat alternatives. Males and those more familiar with the products were more willing to consume alternative protein foods, whereas ethnic Malays were less willing. Attitudinal factors that were unique to specific types of alternative protein foods were concerns over zoonotic diseases (plant-based meat alternatives), distrust in gene technology (cultured meat), food neophobia and animal welfare (insect-based products). Participants were willing to pay more for alternative protein foods if they had concerns over drug residues in meat. Our findings suggest that differential strategies may be needed to promote acceptance of different types of alternative protein foods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultured meat is a novel technology that uses tissue engineering to expand cells taken from animals to grow muscle for consumption as food. Those supporting the technology anticipate it could radically disrupt livestock farming with, they propose, significant benefits for the environment, human health, and animal wellbeing. This paper examines the emergence of this sector through the prism of one of the leading companies – Memphis Meats – in particular focusing upon their online recruitment activity in online videos. Founded in 2015, by 2020 they had announced investment of over $160 m to build a pilot-plant and recruit staff to bring cultured meat closer to commercialization. This paper argues the company's recruitment videos work to enact what I term "producibility", a concept aligned to existing work on "edibility", that emphasizes the process of becoming that foodstuff (included novel foodstuffs) undergo. I deploy existing theoretical work on multiple categories of futures – big/little, individual/institutional/field – to analyze Memphis Meats' online recruitment activity. I argue that, by entangling science and food futures, the company's videos work to assert the status and politics of cultured meat, render it producible and edible, and articulate a novel and transformative food-professional identity: the cultured meat producer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Food neophobia (FN) is a psychological trait that inhibits one's willingness to eat unfamiliar foods. It is related to the acceptance of insect foods and cultured meat, which are major protein alternatives to conventional meat, and is an important personality trait for understanding the near-future food industry. However, the factor structure of Pliner and Hobden's FN scale (FNS) is unstable due to respondents' cultural backgrounds. Thus, we aimed to develop a Japanese version based on the alternative FNS (FNS-A), the most recent revised version, and to examine its validity., Methods: Four online surveys (preliminary 1: n = 202; preliminary 2: n  = 207; main: n  = 1,079; follow-up: n  = 500) were conducted on the FNS-A. For the main survey, Japanese respondents (aged 20-69 years) answered the Japanese version of the FNS-A (J-FNS-A), their willingness to eat (WTE), and their familiarity with hamburgers containing regular protein foods (ground beef, tofu) and alternative protein foods (soy meat, cultured meat, cricket powder, algae powder, and mealworm powder)., Results: Consistent with the FNS-A, confirmatory factor analysis assuming a two-dimensional structure (approach and avoidance) showed satisfactory model fit indices. The mean J-FNS-A score (Cronbach's α for 8 items = 0.83) was 4.15 [standard deviation ( SD ) = 0.93]. J-FNS-A scores were not associated with age and gender, whereas a greater than moderate association was found with WTE hamburgers containing alternative protein foods ( r s = -0.42 to -0.33). The strength of these negative associations increased as food familiarity decreased ( r  = 0.94). The test-retest reliability at 1 month was also satisfactory ( r  = 0.79)., Discussion: The validity of the J-FNS-A was confirmed. Higher J-FNS-A scores (mean = 41.51, SD  = 9.25, converted to Pliner and Hobden's FNS score) of the respondents suggest that Japanese people prefer conservative foods. This scale could predict the negative attitudes toward foods with low familiarity, such as alternative proteins. The J-FNS-A appears to be a useful psychological tool for assessing Japanese food neophobia tendencies and predicting novel food choices of Japanese individuals., Competing Interests: The authors declare that this study was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as potential conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Kamei, Nishibe, Horie and Kusakabe.)

The rapid development of technologies for cultured meat production has led to new challenges for producers regarding appropriate communication with future customers in order to deliver products to a viable market. Communication analysis of social media enables the identification of the key characteristics of the monitored topic, as well as the main areas of communication by individual users based on active digital footprints. This study aimed to identify the key characteristics of cultured meat based on communication analysis of the social network Twitter. Communication analysis was performed based on 36,356 Tweets posted by 4128 individual users. This analysis identified the following main communicated characteristics: clean meat, future meat, and sustainable meat. Latent Dittrich allocation identified five communication topics: (1) clean and sustainable products, (2) comparisons with plant-based protein and the impact on agribusiness, (3) positive environmental aspects, (4) cultured meat as an alternative protein, and (5) the regulation of cultured meat.

Cultured or “clean” meat (CM) is arguably a more ethical and environmentally sustainable alternative to farmed meat, but several potential psychological barriers exist to its acceptance in the marketplace. The perceptions of youth, as a specific consumer cohort, have not been reported to date despite young adults having more flexible dietary habits and being more likely to avoid red meat because of animal welfare and environmental concerns. Thus, youth represent a demographic that may be more accepting of CM and for whom the pro-environmental consequences of early adoption may be realized across an entire lifespan. In this study of college-aged Canadians (mean = 20 years), we examined perceptions of CM (mixed methods) and assessed the effects of educational messaging about its benefits and then naturalness framing on intention to consume it (within subjects quantitative experimental design). Results show that youth believe CM to be unnatural, ethical, and environmentally friendly, and that taste is an important element of acceptance. Linear regression showed that food disgust was a significant predictor for both intent to incorporate CM into regular diet and completely replace meat/meat substitutes with CM. In both instances, increasing food disgust was associated with lower behavioral intent. Environmental values were also a predictor for completely replacing meat/meat substitutes with CM, where it positively affected intent and showed a similar effect size to food disgust. Both messaging on the benefits of CM and naturalness framing increased intent to consume it across all three measures and by a similar magnitude [p (F) < 0.05]. These findings provide timely and actionable information for both CM producers and marketers and contribute to scholarship on the role of values and psychological traits in sustainable food choices.

Due to the considerable environmental impact and the controversial animal welfare associated with industrial meat production, combined with the ever-increasing global population and demand for meat products, sustainable production alternatives are indispensable. In 2013, the world's first laboratory grown hamburger made from cultured muscle cells was developed. However, coming at a price of $300.000, and being produced manually, substantial effort is still required to reach sustainable large-scale production. One of the main challenges is scalability. Microcarriers (MCs), offering a large surface/volume ratio, are the most promising candidates for upscaling muscle cell culture. However, although many MCs have been developed for cell lines and stem cells typically used in the medical field, none have been specifically developed for muscle stem cells and meat production. This paper aims to discuss the MCs' design criteria for skeletal muscle cell proliferation and subsequently for meat production based on three scenarios: (1) MCs are serving only as a temporary substrate for cell attachment and proliferation and therefore they need to be separated from the cells at some stage of the bioprocess, (2) MCs serve as a temporary substrate for cell proliferation but are degraded or dissolved during the bioprocess, and (3) MCs are embedded in the final product and therefore need to be edible. The particularities of each of these three bioprocesses will be discussed from the perspective of MCs as well as the feasibility of a one-step bioprocess. Each scenario presents advantages and drawbacks, which are discussed in detail, nevertheless the third scenario appears to be the most promising one for a production process. Indeed, using an edible material can limit or completely eliminate dissociation/degradation/separation steps and even promote organoleptic qualities when embedded in the final product. Edible microcarriers could also be used as a temporary substrate similarly to scenarios 1 and 2, which would limit the risk of non-edible residues.

Clean Meat is an emerging technology which promises to revolutionize the global food market. Alongside technological developments, the social impact of this innovation is being explored. Consumer acceptance will depend on multiple factors. For Orthodox Jews, the critical question will be whether the new food can be defined as kosher. In the absence of an exact precedent in Talmudic case law, scholars have begun to examine which set of principles would govern the status of the new meat product. Traditionally, meat is permitted for kosher consumption only when it derives from a kosher species which has been kosher slaughtered in accordance with strict regulations. There is room to suggest that this same set of rules would determine the status of any product derived through cellular agriculture, and thus the source cells would have to be extracted from a kosher species and only after kosher slaughter. Another approach would be to view the process as so different from the traditional growth of meat that it may be defined as kosher, even where traditional meat would not. Three determining factors will be: (1) the source of the original cells from which clean meat will be produced (animal species and cell type), (2) the nature of the growth medium, and (3) the exact nature of the process involved, which will determine whether the final product is considered a “new entity” or merely an “inheritance” of the starter cells. An authoritative ruling must be based on an in-depth appreciation of the scientific methods involved.

Cellular agriculture has been considered a mechanism to enable the generation of animal protein in the laboratory. Notwithstanding, this emerging technology, still on an experimental scale, is imbued with speculations, paradoxes, and ambiguities. So, the objective of this research was to analyze how synthetic meat is considered in the scientific context from the perspective of cellular agriculture considering its trajectory and its approaches. For this, we used a systematic review of the literature with detailed analysis of 109 manuscripts and application of network analysis of co-citations and predominance. This paper has constructed a historical overview of the conceptual evolution of science concerning synthetic meat from its emergence to the present day. We also verified and categorized the research about synthetic meat into three distinct approaches: (1) environmental and health; (2) technical and economic feasibility of the production process; and (3) social and market. This research maximizes the understanding of synthetic meat and its stage of technological and economic development to make commercial production feasible. Aside from that, it has brought insights about synthetic meat and this knowledge can be used by the conventional meat industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultured/clean/cell-based meat (CM) now has a near two decade history of laboratory research, commencing with the early NASA-funded work at Touro College and the bioarts practice of the Tissue Culture and Art project. Across this period the field, or as it is now more commonly termed, the “space,” has developed significantly while promoting different visions for what CM is and can do, and the best mechanisms for delivery. Here we both analyse and critically engage with this near-twenty year period as a productive provocation to those engaged with CM, or considering becoming so. This paper is not a history of the field, and does not offer a comprehensive timeline. Instead it identifies significant activities, transitions, and moments in which key meanings and practices have taken form or exerted influence. We do this through analyzing two related themes: the CM “institutional context” and the CM “interpretative package.” The former, the institutional context, refers to events and infrastructures that have come into being to support and shape the CM field, including university activities, conferences, third sector groups, various potential funding mechanisms, and the establishment of a start-up sector. The latter, the interpretative package, refers to the constellation of factors that shape or assert how CM should be understood, including the various names used to describe it, accounts of what it will achieve, and most recently, the emergent regulatory discussions that frame its legal standing. Across the paper we argue it is productive to think of the CM community in terms of a first and second wave. The first wave was more university-based and broadly covers the period from the millennium until around the 2013 cultured burger event. The second wave saw the increasing prevalence of a start-up culture and the circuits of venture capital interest that support it. Through this analysis we seek to provoke further reflection upon how the CM community has come to be as it is, and how this could develop in the future.

Cultured meat can be produced from growing animal cells in-vitro rather than as part of a living animal. This technology has the potential to address several of the major ethical, environmental, and public health concerns associated with conventional meat production. However, research has highlighted some consumer uncertainty regarding the concept. Although several studies have examined the media coverage of this new food technology, research linking different frames to differences in consumer attitudes is lacking. In an experimental study, we expose U.S. adults (n = 480) to one of three different frames on cultured meat: “societal benefits,” “high tech,” and “same meat.” We demonstrate that those who encounter cultured meat through the “high tech” frame have significantly more negative attitudes toward the concept, and are significantly less likely to consume it. Worryingly, this has been a very dominant frame in early media coverage of cultured meat. Whilst this is arguably inevitable, since its technologically advanced nature is what makes it newsworthy, we argue that this high tech framing may be causing consumers to develop more negative attitudes toward cultured meat than they otherwise might. Implications for producers and researchers are discussed.

Increasing public awareness of foodborne illnesses, factory farming, and the ecological footprint of the meat industry, has generated the need for animal-free meat alternatives. In the last decade, scientists have begun to leverage the knowledge and tools accumulated in the fields of stem cells and tissue engineering toward the development of cell-based meat (i.e., clean meat). In tissue engineering, the physical and biochemical features of the native tissue can be mimicked; cells and biomaterials are integrated under suitable culture conditions to form mature tissues. More specifically, in skeletal muscle tissue engineering, a plurality of cell types can be co-cultured on a 3D scaffold to generate muscle fibers, blood vessels and a dense extracellular matrix (ECM). This review focuses on tissue engineering of skeletal muscle and the adjustments needed for clean meat development. We discuss the skeletal muscle structure and composition, and elaborate on cell types from farm animals that have the potential to recapitulate the muscle ECM, blood vessels, muscle fibers and fat deposits. We also review relevant biomaterials, primarily for fabricating scaffolds that can mimic the intramuscular connective tissues, as well as gene expression studies on the biological pathways that influence meat quality.

Recent years have seen increasing interest in research on consumer acceptance of clean meat. Whilst some consumers are enthusiastic about the prospect of reducing the health risks, environmental harms, and animal welfare implications associated with conventional meat production, others have concerns about the product's taste, price, safety, and naturalness. Some evidence suggests that acceptance of clean meat will vary substantially across cultures, though there is currently a lack of quantitative research in Asia and country comparisons on this topic. Both are likely to be important areas given the forecasted increase in meat consumption in developing countries. Participants (n = 3.030) were recruited through the research panel CINT to take an online questionnaire about clean meat and plant-based meat. The participants were representative of China, India, and the U.S. in terms of age and gender, though participants in India and China were disproportionately urban, high income, and well-educated. As well as clean meat, participants were asked about plant-based meat, a conceptually similar product with similar potential to displace demand for conventional meat. They also answered the Meat Attachment Questionnaire and the Food Neophobia Scale. We compared these variables between countries, and used regression models to identify which demographic and attitudinal factors predicted purchase intent toward both products. We found significantly higher acceptance of clean and plant-based meat in India and China compared to the USA. We also found significantly higher food neophobia and significantly lower meat attachment in India compared to China and the USA. We identified several demographic patterns of clean and plant-based meat acceptance as well as which beliefs were important predictors of acceptance within each country. In particular, higher familiarity predicted higher acceptance of plant-based and clean meat across all countries. We found high levels of acceptance of clean meat in the three most populous countries worldwide, and with even higher levels of acceptance in China and India compared to the USA. These results underline the importance of clean meat producers exploring new markets for their products, especially as meat consumption in developing countries continues to rise.

Clean meat (grown from animal cells rather than rearing animals) has the potential to address many concerns associated with meat production. However, research suggests that the perceived unnaturalness of clean meat could be a barrier to consumer acceptance. This study investigated the efficacy of different messages designed to address consumers' concerns about clean meat naturalness. In an experimental design, participants read one of four messages: clean meat is natural, conventional meat is unnatural, naturalness is not important, or highlighting benefits of clean meat without addressing naturalness. The results indicated that arguing that conventional meat is unnatural resulted in a significant increase in some measures of acceptance compared to other messages. Arguing that clean meat is natural and challenging the appeal to nature were less persuasive, and challenging the appeal to nature resulted in some measures of acceptance being lower than not addressing naturalness. We discuss these results in the context of existing naturalness research and give recommendations for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Cultured meat forms part of the emerging field of cellular agriculture. Still an early stage field it seeks to deliver products traditionally made through livestock rearing in novel forms that require no, or significantly reduced, animal involvement. Key examples include cultured meat, milk, egg white and leather. Here, we focus upon cultured meat and its technical, socio-political and regulatory challenges and opportunities. Scope and approach The paper reports the thinking of an interdisciplinary team, all of whom have been active in the field for a number of years. It draws heavily upon the published literature, as well as our own professional experience. This includes ongoing laboratory work to produce cultured meat and over seventy interviews with experts in the area conducted in the social science work. Key findings and conclusions Cultured meat is a promising, but early stage, technology with key technical challenges including cell source, culture media, mimicking the in-vivo myogenesis environment, animal-derived and synthetic materials, and bioprocessing for commercial-scale production. Analysis of the social context has too readily been reduced to ethics and consumer acceptance, and whilst these are key issues, the importance of the political and institutional forms a cultured meat industry might take must also be recognised, and how ambiguities shape any emergent regulatory system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to its proponents, animal-free animal food products, such as cultured meat and synthetic cow’s milk, have the potential to overcome various environmental, health and ethical challenges that have emerged around global animal product consumption and the industrial agriculture that is needed to support it. Apart from the myriad of technical problems making animal-free food products, critics have pointed out the blurry ontological status of the food and the ethical challenges therein, and have questioned the veracity of the various promissory narratives being produced. This paper considers animal-free food from a social studies of economies and markets (SSEM) perspective. As a market that currently mostly only exists in potential, an SSEM perspective can reveal the various social and material relations that comprise the (bio)capital formation that will underpin any market-to-be, an aspect of markets that are often invisible once markets are up and running. Moreover, this perspective details the intimate role markets have in establishing the ethical and ontological aspects of animal-free foods in a political economy shaped by neoliberalisation and financialisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clean meat (meat grown in cell culture rather than obtained from animal slaughter) is an emerging biotechnology industry that will ameliorate the serious environmental, sustainability, global public health, and animal welfare concerns of industrial animal agriculture. While many technologies and products developed for the cell therapy industry can already be applied to clean meat, significant opportunities exist to expand product lines to supply this emerging industry. Large-scale cell culture for clean meat production presents a number of unique requirements that are not currently met by existing products and processes from the biomedical industry − most notably related to cost constraints and scale requirements. Developing these tools for clean meat would simultaneously advance the technology and reduce costs for biomedical and therapeutic applications. We will discuss new applications of current biomedical products and manufacturing methods for clean meat, as well as opportunities for synergistic product development through partnerships between academic researchers, established industry players in cell-based therapeutics, and the emerging clean meat industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultured meat is meat produced from stem cell biopsies of cattle. Stem cells were cultured in a bioreactor in the presence of serum to grow the flesh to maturity. Cultured meat technology originated from regenerative medical technology; however, it has been given a new lease of life to produce cultured meat as an innovative food source in the future without involving cattle breeding. This technology can reduce the negative environmental impacts of global warming, water use, soil, and unethical handling of animals. In the excitement of accepting this new technology, the halal status of cultured meat is in question, as it can be produced from embryonic stem cells and myosatellite cells, each of which can be disputed for their halal status. Additionally, the process of culturing and maturation of stem cells involves the use of an impure medium derived from animal blood. Thus, cultured meat is acceptable to Muslims only if the stem cells, medium and scaffold biomaterials used to manufacture it are from Halal sources and shall be in line with the six principles discussed in this study. The discussion is based on Halal and haram animals; Animal slaughtering; Not derived from a source of najs (impurity); Istihalah tammah (perfect substance change); Maslahah (public interest or benefit) and mafsadah (damage); and Darurat (exigency) of cultured meat)). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study focuses on the details of consumer response to lab grown 'cultured meat (CM)', compared to meat derived from insects, plants and animals. A sample of 254 New Zealanders were interviewed. A word association exercise revealed that consumer reaction to CM was dominated by affective, rather than cognitive factors. The linkages between a general food neophobia scale, a specific CM evaluation scale and purchase intent were studied. The general neophobia scale performed poorly as a predictor, while the 19-point CM evaluation scale performed well. Reducing this scale to its seven affective components, and then to just the two key affective components did not significantly reduce the scale's predictive performance. Overall, the results of this research reveal very significant differences in preference for meat products based upon their origins. Insect protein was strongly disfavoured over all alternatives, while cultured meat was significantly disfavoured compared to more established alternatives. The implications of this for the commercialisation of CM are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]