EMBL Barcelona's bovine stem cells grow into 0.6 millimetre muscle, nerve and vessel tissue in 15 days
A team at EMBL Barcelona has grown bovine embryonic stem cells into three-dimensional aggregates 0.6 millimetres across in 15 days, each holding skeletal muscle fibres, spinal neurons and the endothelial cells that form primitive blood vessel networks. The cells arranged themselves without the assembly steps cultivated-meat work usually needs. Miki Ebisuya's group calls the result an early proof of concept: the tissue stays tiny, the vessel networks immature and the culture media expensive.
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A 0.6 millimetre bovine tissue grown at EMBL Barcelona in 15 days
The team at EMBL Barcelona started from an established line of bovine embryonic stem cells that can be grown and multiplied in the laboratory over long periods. Guiding those cells, the researchers obtained three components of muscle tissue at once: skeletal muscle cells, neurons, and the endothelial cells that build blood vessels. The cells arranged themselves into three-dimensional, tissue-like aggregates without the complex assembly techniques current methods require. Working with the protocol developed in Miki Ebisuya's group, the researchers obtained aggregates 0.6 millimetres in diameter in 15 days, each one holding muscle fibres alongside networks of endothelial cells and spinal neurons that interacted with the muscle. The study is peer reviewed and appears in Nature Communications.[1], [2]
Embryonic cells get past the limits of adult cells
Cultivated beef work has so far leaned on stem cells taken from adult cows. Those cells can build muscle, but they divide a limited number of times and are already committed to certain tissue types, leaving the diversity of cell types found in real meat hard to recreate. Embryonic stem cells proliferate over long periods and keep the ability to develop into many different cell types. Marina Sanaki-Matsumiya, a former postdoctoral fellow in the Ebisuya group and now an assistant professor at the University of Tsukuba, said that instead of growing each cell type separately and assembling them afterwards, the team showed embryonic stem cells can develop together and self-organise. Endothelial cells matter as much: in living tissue blood vessels deliver oxygen and nutrients, and the vessel-like networks in these aggregates, still primitive, count as a step towards larger cultured tissues.[2], [3]
The team calls the result an early proof of concept
The researchers describe the result as an early proof of concept rather than a recipe for cultivated steaks. Miki Ebisuya said the tissue is still very small, and that something resembling a steak would need much larger tissues with more mature blood vessel networks able to support continued growth. Cost is the second limit: growing embryonic stem cells and directing their development currently takes expensive culture media and reagents, which keeps food production at industrial volume economically out of reach. The team also sets out a use beyond food, since the system holds several interacting cell types: the aggregates offer a platform for studying muscle development and tissue engineering in ways simpler cell cultures make hard to reach.[2], [1]
