Meat the Future

This is a story of planetary hope

inspired by one of the biggest ideas of the century,

the fate of our planet may depend on a new food science

that grows real meat directly from animal cells

without the need to breed, raise, and slaughter animals.

Let's face it, conventional animal agriculture

is wreaking havoc,

it occupies nearly half of the world's land,

produces huge amounts of greenhouse gases

and there's a potential breeding ground

for health pandemics like COVID 19.

With meat consumption expected to double by 2050,

we urgently need solutions.

Welcome to the next agricultural revolution.

This is the first time a meatball has ever been cooked

with beef cells that did not require a cow to be slaughtered

This has been something

that I've been dreaming about since I was a kid.

Thinking about the impact on human lives and animal lives

and the ills of food production.

It's been ten years since I finished training

in cardiology at the Mayo Clinic and wanted to be able to pursue

an idea of can you grow meat from animal cells

and I'm extremely fortunate to have the support I have at home.

My wife and kids are being proud of what I am doing.

Over the last few years we spent a lot of time

talking about what if your dad started this company.

And if we had to move, how would it look like?

It was extremely hard for us even to have the conversation

because I'm a very involved dad.

The last year has been determined

by the amount of changes in our lives.

So you know, I founded the company

built an amazing team here.

I quit Cardiology, operating from my home in Minnesota.

I've never been away from home more than 20 days a year.

In the last year, it's been like

250 days or something so.

It just went up in magnitude.

And I can see it only getting busier

and I can see that you know,

this requires that I'm under someone to focus, and passion.

We just have to keep trying.

Hi, Jason. Can you hear me well?

Yes, I can.

And how do I sound to you?

You sound clear.

Okay, great.

So let me make sure I'm pronouncing your name, right.

Dr. Uma Valeti, Right?

That's correct.

How much funding did you take on?

Is this venture back now or give us some idea?

So this was founded by Nick and myself

and Will from Memphis and the three of us,

we raised about $3.1 million.

We had a venture capital group called Indy Bio

that funded us.

Okay, this will be an edit, so just a moment.

What type of doctor are you?

I'm a cardiologist.

Okay, oh great. Let's just, let's just dive in and do this.

It's my pleasure to welcome Dr Uma Valeti.

He is CEO of Memphis Meats.

So Uma, lab grown meat brings to mind

Frankenfood, playing with nature.

All of this kind of stuff take us through the process

of how you grow meat in your labs.

Yes, so let me just preface this by saying we are not calling

this lab grown meat because there is

confusion out there that 'are you

making this from plant proteins?'

'Are you synthesizing something?'

What is this? This is authentic meat.

But when you say it's authentic meat

I just beg to differ with you, maybe.

Just correct me if I'm wrong you are engineering it.

It's not. It's not completely

natural, if you will?

So we take cells

from whether it's a cow, a pig or a chicken

then we provide them with rich nutrients

these cells grow and become meat tissue.

So that's the process of making the meat and...

Okay, okay. But I want you to explain what's happening here.

I mean, are you basically cloning meat?

Right? Is that what you're doing?

So we are not cloning anything.

We are growing these cells. So these cells are growing

and becoming muscle tissue.

Look, we are pioneers in this area.

We're starting this on the commercial side,

But, it's so funny, like you have to change

your thinking and your vocabulary to even discuss the subject.

It's just such an odd new concept

This is a real mind blower.

This is a huge shift.

I would like to be an investor

because I have a feeling this might be

one of the biggest ideas in the history of the world.

So we literally moved into the space about four and a half weeks ago.

You know it will take another four to six weeks

to get this place up and running and that creates a sense of

restlessness in me and Nick and you know everybody

on our team because, you know we want to get going like yesterday

I know eventually the speed at which

we can come to the market is going to be

a function of funding and I think it's our goal

to keep printing when we can, take brief periods of rest

and then start printing again.

So operations update.

Right? This is the key for us. The focus for April will be

for all of us is to get up and running.

And I'm thinking we should

look at the farm, the large equipment

or the small equipment, and

you know what you have in terms of timelines for those.

There will be lots of, you know, challenges we have.

Of course, there are challenges.

It's never been done in the history of the world.

But I think we are taking the first step

and I think this first step is going to have lots

and lots of people also join us in that step

and we feel like we're going to kick start a revolution.

I have always had an interest in my social justice issues,

environmental justice issues.

Pretty much my whole life all I wanted to do was be a chef

and I wanted to focus on meat.

About half way through college

and I was like, no more basketball.

I need a career. I love science, I always have.

What I get really excited about

is engineering biology.

So my training is in biomedical engineering.

I was actually a tissue engineer.

I learned about some of the animal welfare implications

of animal agriculture, and that was kind of what did it for me.

I learned a lot about factory farming

and the conditions that animals are kept in.

The impact it has on the environment that I just had no idea about.

I took an urban agriculture class

that really opened my eyes to what we were doing to the planet

just by feeding ourselves

At first, I actually thought it was

kind of strange because I had been very ingrained

in the medical applications,

and then I started reading more about it.

Uma Valeti wanders across my Facebook feed with a meatball.

My brain exploded and I was like, 'I have to talk to these people'.

Yeah, it's like I got to be a part of this.

Like I have the skills.

Assert yourself and it will happen.

Basically. Pretty much.

I thought this could be a really great way to change the world

and incorporate my love of science,

but also my desire to make cool stuff.

That's kind of my story of way, why and how I got here.

So these are the samples of live tissue.

Billions of cells in this tiny portion right here.

These ones are called punch biopsies, where a large needle

essentially is inserted in the animal

and takes out a small cylinder of tissue.

The taste, texture and flavor of meat

is a combination of manufacturers.

It's not just muscle cells, it's fats.

It's connective tissues.

It's all sorts of things. And we're taking those small

samples of meat or tissue apart so we can better understand

the different components and use that to build our product.

These are very precious biological samples

which are going to give us huge insights

into the biology of the animals.

And these are stem cells sources

for future products.

These small tissue samples

will produce extremely large amounts of meat.

Traditionally in tissue culture,

one of the elements of the food that you're giving the cells

is fetal bovine serum.

If you start with fetal calf serum,

essentially, you're starting with this perfect

rich broth of awesome stuff that is designed

to make things grow and thrive.

But one of the scientific goals

of the company right now is to eliminate any animal

derived product from our process as soon as possible.

We want to separate the animal from meat making.

To develop a consistent media with no animal derived

components in which our cells could thrive at a large scale.

That would definitely be a...

really great moment for our company.

It would probably be a while before we announced that that had happened.

because you want there to be a lot of internal validation.

There are all these systems that animals have been building up

through millions of years of evolution

and that includes a digestive system and an immune system.

So in some ways, cellular agriculture is more simple

because you're just focusing on this one part of the animal.

Instead of saying, you know, all I want is the Tenderloin.

But I have to grow the liver, too but it's also a little