3D printed meat?

So, 3D printed burgers? Well not exactly. At least not yet. 3D printing has been in a boom in the last decade. While People have printed various scaled inorganic parts for all kinds of needs in everyday life, the most revolutionary use of 3D printing is printing organic materials. In other words, meat. 3D printing has shown a myriad of uses in the medical field. From printing blood vessels to skin grafts. Jokes aside, I really did mean meat in the sense of steaks and burgers. Recently, an article was released in which the details of 3D printing meat were disclosed.

I was fascinated to learn that 3D printing meat is even more complicated than I previously thought. Having some experience with 3D printing plastics in high school, I understood some of the complexities involved in printing, but I was naïve to all of the struggles. For example, in order to print seafood, the printing must be done at 4 degrees Celsius; this is done in order to prevent the growth of microorganisms within the meat. It had not occurred to me that the ambient environment in which you print could have such a large impact on the success of a print.

Along with being oblivious to the struggles of 3D printing I was also unaware of many of the benefits. For example, 3D printed meat can have a more specific nutritional range than regular farmed meat since you know exactly what goes inside the meat (hopefully it would mean no more mystery meat at fast food places). Additionally, 3D printing meat would allow us to cut down on farming/cattle production which would allow for numerous environmental benefits.

The possibilities seem endless when it comes to 3D printing. However, when something with “limitless” potential arises, the question of ethics come into mind. That is where should we draw the line? While 3D printing seems to benefit everyone does that mean we should print food? Unfortunately, as of right now the cost effectiveness in addition to the acceptance of 3D printing meat prevent it from being normalized. Nevertheless, it is a field that will continued to be researched. That being said, from an ethical standpoint does 3D printing food allow for better “respect for life”, or would it create a disconnect between man and mother nature? Just some food for thought.

Dick, A., Bhandari, B., & Prakash, S. (2019). 3D printing of meat. Meat Science, 153, 35–44. doi: 10.1016/j.meatsci.2019.03.005

Dick, A., Bhandari, B., & Prakash, S. (2019). Post-processing feasibility of composite-layer 3D printed beef. Meat Science, 153, 9–18. doi: 10.1016/j.meatsci.2019.02.024