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Similar to meat production, cuts and agriculture can lead to high environmental tolls. Now an MIT team has proposed a way to prevent this by growing a few plant tissues in the lab, something similar to cultured meat.
The researchers, in the group of Luis Fernando Velásquez-García in the Microsystems Technology Laboratories group, planted wood-like plant tissues indoors, with no soil or sunlight. They began with a zinnia, extracting living cells from its leaves and cultivating them in a liquid medium for growth, metabolism and reproduction.
ASHLEY BECKWITH
They then transferred the cells to a gel and “tuned” them, explains Velásquez-García: “Plant cells are similar to stem cells, meaning that they can become anything if induced.” By changing the level of two hormones in the cell, the researchers controlled the production of lignin in the cells, a polymer that gives the wood firmness. The room itself acted as a scaffold to encourage the cells to grow in a certain shape.
Although the technology is far from ready for the market, lana points to a possible method of producing biomaterials with a much smaller environmental footprint.
“The way these materials are obtained has not changed over the centuries and is very effective,” says Velásquez-García. “This is a real opportunity to avoid all this inefficiency.”
In other words, “If you want a table, you just have to grow a table.”
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