Biofabrication's Contribution to the Evolution of Cultured Meat.

Cultured Meat (CM) is a growing field in cellular agriculture, driven by the environmental impact of conventional meat production, which contributes to climate change and occupies ≈70% of arable land. As demand for meat alternatives rises, research in this area expands. CM production relies on tissue engineering techniques, where a limited number of animal cells are cultured in vitro and processed to create meat-like tissue comprising muscle and adipose components. Currently, CM is primarily produced on a small scale in pilot facilities. Producing a large cell mass based on suitable cell sources and bioreactors remains challenging. Advanced manufacturing methods and innovative materials are required to subsequently process this cell mass into CM products on a large scale. Consequently, CM is closely linked with biofabrication, a suite of technologies for precisely arranging cellular aggregates and cell-material composites to construct specific structures, often using robotics. This review provides insights into contemporary biomedical biofabrication technologies, focusing on significant advancements in muscle and adipose tissue biofabrication for CM production. Novel materials for biofabricating CM are also discussed, emphasizing their edibility and incorporation of healthful components. Finally, initial studies on biofabricated CM are examined, addressing current limitations and future challenges for large-scale production.

Scaffolds for Cultured Meat on the Basis of Polysaccharide Hydrogels Enriched with Plant-Based Proteins.

The world population is growing and alternative ways of satisfying the increasing demand for meat are being explored, such as using animal cells for the fabrication of cultured meat. Edible biomaterials are required as supporting structures. Hence, we chose agarose, gellan and a xanthan-locust bean gum blend (XLB) as support materials with pea and soy protein additives and analyzed them regarding material properties and biocompatibility. We successfully built stable hydrogels containing up to 1% pea or soy protein. Higher amounts of protein resulted in poor handling properties and unstable gels. The gelation temperature range for agarose and gellan blends is between 23-30 °C, but for XLB blends it is above 55 °C. A change in viscosity and a decrease in the swelling behavior was observed in the polysaccharide-protein gels compared to the pure polysaccharide gels. None of the leachates of the investigated materials had cytotoxic effects on the myoblast cell line C2C12. All polysaccharide-protein blends evaluated turned out as potential candidates for cultured meat. For cell-laden gels, the gellan blends were the most suitable in terms of processing and uniform distribution of cells, followed by agarose blends, whereas no stable cell-laden gels could be formed with XLB blends.

Toxicity of ionizing radiation (IR) in a human induced pluripotent stem cell (hiPSC)-derived 3D early neurodevelopmental model.

Prenatal brain development is a complex and sensitive process, highly susceptible to environmental influences such as pollutants, stress, malnutrition, drugs, tobacco exposure, or ionizing radiation (IR). Disturbances in development may cause life-long disabilities and diseases, such as ADHD, childhood cancers, cognitive problems, depression, anxiety and more severe developmental disabilities. Due to increasing medical imaging, radiation therapy, natural terrestrial radiation, radioactive pollution and long-distance flights, humans are increasingly exposed to IR. However, data on impact of IR on very early human brain development are scarce, particularly in the very first weeks of gestation. Here we investigated the effects of low-dose X-ray IR (1 Gy) in a 3D early brain developmental model derived from human pluripotent stem cells. In this model very early neural stem cells, neuroectodermal progenitor cells (NEP), were exposed to low-dose IR and direct as well as delayed effects were investigated. Expression of 20 different marker genes crucial for normal neural development was determined 48 h and 9 days post IR (pIR). All but one of the analyzed marker genes were reduced 48 h after IR, and all but seven genes normalized their expression by day 9 pIR. Among the seven markers were genes involved in neurodevelopmental and growth abnormalities. Moreover, we could show that stemness of the NEP was reduced after IR. We were thus able to identify a significant impact of radiation in cells surviving low-dose IR, suggesting that low-dose IR could have a negative impact on the early developing human brain, with potential later detrimental effects.