This page is a timeline of major events in the history of cellular agriculture. Cellular agriculture refers to the development of agricultural products - especially animal products - from cell cultures rather than the bodies of living organisms. This includes in vitro or cultured meat, as well as cultured dairy, eggs, leather, gelatin, and silk. In recent years a number of cellular animal agriculture companies and non-profits have emerged due to technological advances and increasing concern over the animal welfare and rights, environmental, and public health problems associated with conventional animal agriculture.[1]
Timeline
Year
Event
1912
French biologist Alexis Carrel keeps a piece of chick heart muscle alive in a Petri dish, demonstrating the possibility of keeping muscle tissue alive outside of the body.[2]
1930
Frederick Edwin Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead predicts that "It will no longer be necessary to go to the extravagant length of rearing a bullock in order to eat its steak. From one 'parent' steak of choice tenderness it will be possible to grow as large and as juicy a steak as can be desired."[3]
1932
Winston Churchill writes "Fifty years hence we shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium."[3]
Real Vegan Cheese, a startup aimed at creating cultured cheese, is founded.[16]
2014
Modern Meadow presents "steak chips", discs of lab-grown meat that could be produced at relatively low cost.[12]
2015
The Modern Agriculture Foundation, which focuses on developing cultured chicken meat (as chickens make up the large majority of land animals killed for food[17]), is founded in Israel.[18]
2015
According to Mark Post's lab, the cost of producing a cultured hamburger patty drops from $325,000 in 2013 to less than $12.[19]
2016
New Crop Capital, a private venture capital fund investing in alternatives to animal agriculture - including cellular agriculture - is founded. Its $25 million portfolio includes cultured meat company Memphis Meats and cultured collagen company Gelzen, along with Lighter, a software platform designed to facilitate plant-based eating, a plant-based meal delivery service called Purple Carrot, a dairy alternative Lyrical Foods, the New Zealand plant-based meat company Sunfed, and alternative cheese company Miyoko’s Kitchen.[20]
2016
The Good Food Institute, an organization devoted to promoting alternatives to animal food products - including cellular agriculture - is founded.[21]
2016
Memphis Meats announces the creation of the first cultured meatball.[22]
2016
New Harvest hosted New Harvest 2016: Experience Cellular Agriculture, the first-ever global cellular agriculture conference.[23]
2018
Paul Shapiro's book Clean Meat: How Growing Meat Without Animals Will Revolutionize Dinner and the World, which chronicles the entrepreneurs, scientists and investors seeking to create the world's first slaughter-free meat.[24] The book was placed on The Washington Post's bestseller list.[25]
2019
Perfect Day (formerly Muufri) sells 1000 3-pint bundles of ice cream made with non-animal whey protein.[26]
2020
Memphis Meats received a US$161 million investment in its Series B, which is more than everything that had been invested in the industry so far which was US$155 million.[27]
2021
Tufts University is awarded US$10 million by the USDA to establish the National Institute for Cellular Agriculture.[28]