In this interesting video, Andreas Forgacs states that “By the year 2050 over 100 billion animals will be need to supply the world with meat, leather, and other goods (Forgacs).” Keeping all these animals under control will soon begin effecting the population. What if there was something that could prevent this from happening? Forgacs suggest that the solution to this problem is bio fabrication of animal cells. Bio fabrication simply means taking a cell from an animal with no harm and then slowly producing meat and skin by placing it in a medium. Bio fabrication has already been done in the Forgacs own business called “Modern meadow” where they have grown human parts such as an ear. This process would mean no longer killing or harming animals but instead receiving these goods in a more civilized way.
How is this done you may ask. In bio fabrication a simple cell is taken from an animal through biopsy causing no harm to the animal. This cell is then grown in a medium or a brewery such as were wine is cultured. These cells continue to multiply into billion of cells until the skin of an animal is produced. Once many sheets of skin are made scientist begin to layer it depending on how thick or thin it was wanted to be. After reaching the thickness that seems right it will be fused together, then it is tanned through a much less harming chemical process then the final product leather is made. Many may question if bio fabricated leather is the same as other leather the answer is yes. This leather has the same characteristics because it was made from the same cell.
It was explained in the video that one of the good qualities of this leather is that it “has no hair to be removed, no scars and bug bites, and no waste is produced.” This means that the process of making leather will not take as long to be made if it is made through fabrication. Also the size of the leather will not become a problem either. It is not limited to shape and can be made into many different things. For example if you wanted to make a couch you could just grow a size large enough were as for now you have to fuse many pieces together to make it whole. Since it is controlled pieces of leather, the characteristics can be controlled as well such as making it transparent or making it dark. The leather can also be changed to meet needs such as texture or how durable it may be.
Forgacs theory of bio fermentation was extremely useful because it shed insight on the difficult problems we are having with maintaining land and livestock well enough to produce leather, meat, and other goods that we need. I believe the process of fabrication for leather can be useful in many helpful ways such as prevention of new disease. When farmers keep animals closely together they are more likely to form disease, this is then carried out to the meat that is sold to the public. The bacteria that is consumed when eating this meat is at no way healthy to humans that eat it. With fabricated meat, there is no risk of biting into a piece of bacteria full meat because it is all grown in a lab. “Livestock is one of the largest producers of green house gases (Forgacs).” These gasses contribute to the rise of global warming. With fewer livestock needed the amount of green houses gases will be reduced meaning global warming will slow down rather then rise.
When I first heard this story I was weary and unsure what this practice of