In January 2022 we were invited to contribute to a new collection being assembled by Professor Mark Post, Professor Che Connon, and Dr. Chris Bryant called ‘Advances in cultured meat technology’. The editors wanted New Harvest to write a chapter on the infrastructure of cultured meat.
The invitation was timely because after years of field-building work in start-ups and academia, “infrastructure” was becoming the next big theme for New Harvest. In our strategic plan we went so far as to say: “If cellular agriculture is a new city, New Harvest’s initiatives are the critical infrastructure projects – the pipelines for talent development, the bridges between stakeholders, and the roads to new discoveries.”
So I’m thrilled to share that the book, Advances in cultured meat technology is now available for pre-order at £140.00… But even better, our chapter, Creating an infrastructure for cultured meat is available completely free and open access at the link below.
The chapter has a separate DOI because it is open access within a closed book. This is just one way New Harvest is working to improve structural barriers to fostering growth in cellular agriculture.
This chapter would not be possible without the work of an incredible team:
Thank you to New Harvest fellow Irfan Tahir for leading us through this work over nearly two years of writing and editing; to New Harvest board member Miranda Stahn for her writing and perspective; to New Harvest Fellows Stephanie Kawecki, Vicky Andriessen and Bianca Datta for their work on content and editing; to New Harvest Director of RRI – EU Dwayne Holmes for his experience and perspective, and last but not least to New Harvest board member Lejjy Gafour for his point of view and generous contribution which made this chapter available to any curious reader with the internet access.
Give the chapter a read and let us know what you think. What structural changes do you think need to occur for cultured meat to become a reality? Like everything in science, this is an evolving work in progress – the more we learn the better the thesis becomes.
Many thanks to the editors for this opportunity to share our work and point of view as a field-building organization; and of course many thanks to our donors for making this novel work possible!
Onward!