Lab-grown meat: mammoth meatballs

A company that grows meat in the lab has brought a mammoth back to life for a meatball, proving the full potential of lab-grown cells.

The aim of the project, by Australian company Vow Food, was to highlight the possibilities of large-scale slaughter-free animal production, as a tool to combat wildlife destruction and climate change, reports The Guardian.

“We chose the woolly mammoth because it is a symbol of loss of diversity and a symbol of climate change,” said Tim Noakesmith, co-founder of the company.

Scientists said mammoths are now extinct due to over-hunting by humans and global warming after the last ice age.

While many companies are already working to produce different types of conventional meat in the laboratory, such as pork, chicken and beef, the Australian company is studying the production potential of more than 50 species, including alpacas, bison, crocodiles, kangaroos, peacocks and several species of fish.

The mammoth meat was produced with the help of Professor Ernst Wolfitang at the Australian Institute of Bioengineering at the University of Queensland, who used the mammoth DNA sequence to produce the protein, filling in some gaps in knowledge. Elephant DNA helps.

“It was ridiculously easy and fast,” said the professor. We did it in a few weeks.”

The original plan was to produce meat from the long-extinct dodo, but the necessary DNA sequence no longer exists.

So far no one has tasted giant meatballs.