Disabili e lavoro, modello Veneto. Formazione e tirocini il trampolino

Meat grown by research made in Trento

Innovation. The Bruno Cell company uses knowledge from tissue engineering and regenerative medicine to reproduce natural processes. Competitors. The Italian ban on production forces them to concentrate their efforts exclusively on research. Collaborations with Austria and Germany

by Valentina Saini

10 September 2024

Laboratorio. Da un campione animale si selezionano le cellule staminali che vengono nutrite con liquido di coltura e crescono nel bioreattore, che produce temperatura, aerazione e altri parametri per la crescita delle cellule

3' min read

The first Italian start-up in cultured meat is based in Trentino, and is an example of the knowledge economy that the autonomous province has built with decades of investment in research and advanced training, and that has even earned it the nickname of 'Silicon Valley of the Alps' by authoritative foreign newspapers (even though in Trentino, a predominantly mountainous territory, unlike Palo Alto, it is mainly public funds that support research and promote the creation of innovative companies).

Bruno Cell, this is the name of the start-up, was born in late 2019 with a clear objective: to make cultured meat, whose market according to Barclays could be worth 450 billion dollars in 2040, an economically sustainable resource.

He now holds a patent to this very effect and is part of Feasts, a three-year, €7 million budget project with which the European Union (in the usual Brussels jargon) intends to equip itself with 'solid, unbiased knowledge on cultured meat and fish products, and the role they could play in a sustainable food system' and 'develop standards that will shape the future development and implementation of these technologies'.

Il laboratorio

The potential would appear to be considerable, also for combating climate change: according to a study that appeared in The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment in January 2023, for example, the production of one kilogram of cultured meat could emit between 3 and 14 kg of CO2 equivalent (CO2e). By contrast, according to data published five years ago in the prestigious journal Science, 99.48 kg of CO2e are emitted per kilo of beef under the traditional system.

But what does this new way of producing meat consist of? Based on knowledge from medical biotechnology, tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, the technology to produce cultured meat reproduces processes that occur naturally in animals.

Explaining this to Il Sole 24 Ore Nordest is Nike Schiavo, biotechnologist and member of the Bruno Cell team: 'From a donor animal, e.g. a cow, pig, chicken or fish, a small amount of muscle or another part of the body is taken. From this sample, the ideal stem cells are selected to produce muscle and fat. These cells are fed through a culture liquid containing carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins and mineral salts, possibly without using other animal components, and grow in the bioreactor, a container that maintains ideal temperature, ventilation and other chemical/physical parameters for cell growth, similar to the way it is used to produce yoghurt or beer'.

With its first patent, Bruno Cell has protected the innovative methodology that it has developed through three years of research in collaboration with the University of Trento and which, explains CEO Stefano Lattanzi, 'induces cell maturation through temperature variation rather than through the use of a series of specific substances. This means a more efficient process than what already happens, with a reduction in overall costs'.

As is well known, Italy banned the production and sale of cultured meat last year, and in fact Schiavo emphasises: 'We are exclusively dedicated to research, not production. For example, we are also carrying out projects to develop cell lines from pig, sheep, chicken and fish. We collaborate with various research institutes, including in Austria and Germany'.

There is no shortage of obstacles, Lattanzi admits. 'Doing research at an industrial level in such a new field is of course a long and costly process, which takes a long time and bears all the risks of failure typical of R&R. It becomes even more difficult when the political system of one's own country openly declares itself against the commercialisation of the product, while allowing research into it. Regardless of the quality of our research, we will be at a disadvantage compared to our competitors in the Netherlands or the UK, for example, where there is public funding dedicated to the development of our industry and investors feel more comfortable allocating resources.

And while other parts of the world, such as the United States and Singapore, are ahead in the race for cultured meat production (although even in the US there is no shortage of opponents), there is also movement in Europe. A few weeks ago, for example, the first application was submitted to Brussels for the sale of cultured meat by a French start-up for a product made from duck cells to be used for foie gras. The production of the world's most famous pâté has been repeatedly criticised by animal welfare NGOs and the FAO, which denounce that the force-feeding used to fatten the liver of geese or ducks is incompatible with animal welfare.