Lab-Grown Meat

 
 
 

Vocabulary

strip (2)	researcher	grow/grew/grown
process	stem-cell	take/took/taken
mix	synthetic	make/made/made
layer	supply (2)	take for granted
cost	dream (2)	behind (2)
soar (2)	raise (2)	distinguish
dish (3)	resource	demand (2)
clump	efficient	environmentally friendly
wary	push (2)	welfare (2)
muscle	stem (2)	make sense
likely	make do	think/thought/thought
look (2)	livestock	according to
set to	taste (2)	rise/rose/risen
hope	nourish	feed/fed/fed
local	increase	feed/fed/fed
		grow/grew/grown

 
 
 
 
 

Video: Lab-Grown Meat

 
 
 
 

Transcript

This is a strip of muscle grown from stem-cells taken from a cow. It will used to make the world’s first synthetic burger.

The strip is one of thousands grown in a lab in the Netherlands. Researchers mix them with layers of fat, also grown in the lab, to make a burger. It will cost more than two-hundred pounds (£200,000) to make.

For now though, the scientist behind the project will have to make do with today’s fast food.

Professor Mark Post, Maastricht University: “My eventual dream is to produce meat that looks and tastes exactly like this, so you won’t be able to distinguish it from livestock meat.

But you know now that it is produced in an environmentally friendly animal and resource friendly way.”

Professor Post grows stem cells in a dish, which then clump together and grow into muscle. It’s real meat, so should look and taste like the real thing.

Researchers say it’s more efficient than farming. Just one animal could make a billion burgers, a possibility that’s been welcome by animal welfare groups.

But locals at a nearby hotdog restaurant are wary.

Customer One: “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
Journalist: “Now why is that?”
Customer One: “It just doesn’t make sense to me.”

Customer Two: “There’s nothing better than natural meat. And this is how we’ve been raised our whole lives here. So we know the farm where it comes from. We know who’s processing it for us. We know how good it is.”

But in the future, natural is likely to become too expensive. Buying meat in supermarkets is something we take for granted nowadays.

But not for very much longer, according to some economists. They believe that rising demand from China and India, mean that prices are set to soar.

Professor Sean Smukler, University of British Columbia: “We have about a billion people who are undernourished on the planet. And as we push towards nine billion by 2050, we are going to need to produce a lot more food.”

Professor Post hopes that the technology he’s developing will help feed an ever growing and increasingly hungry world.

 

 

Questions

1. The meat featured in the video comes directly and entirely from a cow.

2. Have scientists synthesized an artificial burger that cost them $2.00?

3. Their sole goal is to produce massive quantities of meat. Is this right or wrong?

4. Are ordinary people as enthusiastic about synthetic meat as they are about high-tech devices.

5. In the future will the price of meat increase, decrease or remain the same?

6. What are some figures or numbers mentioned in the report?

7. Professor Post motivated entirely by profit. What do you think?

 

A. Meat is very popular where I live. Yes or no? Which meats are consumed? Which meats are popular?

B. Is meat very expensive, expensive, in the middle, so-so, fairly cheap or very cheap?

C. Is the meat industry very big and important?

D. What might happen in the future?

E. What should scientists, governments and people do?