Vil cellebaseret mælk ændre mejeriindustrien? Dette californiske laboratorium kunne vise vejen

Bioteknologistartup TurtleTree ønsker at ændre den måde, folk indtager mælk på.

Køer er ude - i hvert fald hvad angår malkning. Erstatningen:cellebaseret mælk. Virksomheden siger, at det er i stand til at skabe rå mælk ved hjælp af celler fra pattedyr. Cellerne dyrkes derefter i TurtleTrees laboratorier, og mælken produceres i sidste ende. I gigantiske bioreaktorer klæber cellerne til små sugerør, væsken trækkes derefter gennem sugerørene, og mælken kommer ud i den anden ende.

TurtleTree er i de sidste faser af opførelsen af ​​et 24.000 kvadratmeter stort forsknings- og udviklingsanlæg i West Sacramento, Californien.

Bevæbnet med $40 millioner fra venturekapitalinvestorer flytter TurtleTree fra en fælles virksomhedsinkubationsfacilitet i Woodland, der deles med flere dusin fødevare- og landbrugsstartups til sin egen forsknings- og udviklingsfacilitet.

Anlægget er planlagt til at åbne inden for de næste mange måneder, selvom der ikke er fastsat nogen formel dato.

"Sacramento-området er et knudepunkt for os," sagde TurtleTree medstifter og administrerende direktør Fengru Lin. "Der er ingen vej tilbage. Vi er forpligtet til dette område."

TurtleTree har også et hovedkvarter i Singapore, bystaten, der er Lins hjemby, og en laboratoriefacilitet i Boston, hvor hun gik på MIT med hovedfag i bioteknologi, før hun gik på handelsskole i Frankrig.

Sacramento-områdets forbindelse har at gøre med University of California Davis campus og dets laboratorier, der studerer mælk, hvilket bragte Lin til regionen for partnerskabsaftaler.

TurtleTree US-faciliteten vil i første omgang huse 40 jobs fra fødevareforskere til ingeniører.

Hvorvidt flere job vil udvikle sig, og Sacramento-regionen vil gå på landkortet som en af ​​de første leverandører af cellebaseret mælk i verden, er uklart.

TurtleTree-startudfordringer

De fleste startups fejler, og TurtleTree bliver nødt til at producere et fødevareprodukt, som forbrugerne vil købe. Der findes allerede alternative mejeriprodukter, men Lin sagde, at plantebaseret mælk producerer mindre vigtige proteinkomponenter end komælk.

Hun sagde også, at plantebaseret mælk kommer med deres eget sæt af miljøproblemer. Mandelmælk har for eksempel vist sig at kræve store mængder vand. Havremælk bidrager til problemer som monocropping, hvilket påvirker jordens sundhed.

TurtleTree's produkter skal også godkendes af den føderale Food and Drug Administration. Cellebaseret mælk er i øjeblikket ikke godkendt til køb.

Succes for TurtleTree ville hjælpe Sacramento-regionens bestræbelser på at opbygge et biovidenskabsteknologisk center.

Banebrydende begyndte i februar sidste år på Aggie Square, et kompleks for mere end 1 milliard dollar på University of California Davis Sacramento campus, der bygges for at tiltrække life science-virksomheder. Men det meste af de 1,2 millioner kvadratmeter laboratorie- og kontorlokaler er uudlejet.

Hvor populær kunne cellebaseret mælk være?

Der har været begrænset forskning på markedet for cellebaseret mælk, og en undersøgelse kalder det et nicheprodukt. Men et nicheprodukt med begrænset salg kan stadig være en finansiel guldgrube i den globale mejeriindustri på 871 milliarder dollars.

Lin hævder, at cellebaseret mælk betyder reduktion af dyremishandling, lindrer sundhedsmæssige bekymringer ved indtagelse af mælk samt miljøhensyn.

Hun sagde, at mælkeindtag fra et sundhedsmæssigt synspunkt har været forbundet med både højt kolesteroltal og højt blodtryk. Andre er udelukket fra at købe konventionel mælk på grund af laktoseintolerance.

Lin sagde, at der også opstår problemer med bæredygtighed. Mejeriindustrien er forbundet med høje drivhusgasemissioner, nedbrydning af lokale vandressourcer og tab af biodiversitet.

Hvad er smagen?

But even if everything goes right for TurtleTree, cell-based milk won't be flying off the supermarket shelves without great taste.

While some consumers in select areas of the west and east coast of the U.S. might buy a product because it is healthy or doesn't damage the environment, Lin said the majority will be swayed by taste.

"I sincerely believe we will make food that thrills, delights, and tantalizes again—and then the revolution can truly begin," she said.

Lin said the goal is for people to actually choose alternative proteins not because of what they intellectually know (that it's good for the planet, animals, and their health), but because it's what they intrinsically want.

On Sept. 27, TurtleTree hired chef and sustainability advocate Dominique Crenn as its food innovation advisor, part of the plan to turn out food products that taste good.

Crenn is the only female chef in the United States to receive three Michelin stars, for her flagship restaurant Atelier Crenn in San Francisco. She was also the star of Netflix's hit series "Chef's Table."

History of TurtleTree milk

TurtleeTree was born in 2019 in Singapore. It came out of Lin's desire to learn cheese making.

"I went up to Vermont for a couple of weeks to learn how to make cheese, and I wanted to make cheese in Singapore and Asia, but of course there are no cows," she said. "I had to try to access milk from Indonesia, from Thailand. And yet today there are problems around farming, around hormones and antibiotics coming to the cows, and that affects the milk quality, that affects how the cheese pans out. So I gave up that whole idea."

Starting in 2020, TurtleTree raised the first of $40 million in venture capital funding. She said the money should allow the company to continue its research and commercialization of products.

The name, TurtleTree, and its fingerprint-like logo represent longevity and the team's mission to unlock solutions that help nature and humans at the same time. "Our goal," Lin said, "is to be seen as the gold standard for sustainable food technology when it comes to milk production".

Lin sees the production of cell-based milk being at least several years away in part because TurtleTree needs to refine the process of extracting high-value dairy-based bioactives like lactoferrin in a cost-efficient way.

She said extracting lactoferrin from cow's milk is a highly costly and inefficient process- for one, cow's milk only contains lactoferrin in very low concentrations (only 100mg/1L of milk i.e. about 0.0001%.) as compared to human milk.

Lin said cell-based milk needs to be price competitive with regular milk for it to sell. She said market prices can fluctuate between several hundred dollars to $2000 for a kg of bovine lactoferrin.

TurtleTree is also looking for revenue sources sooner rather than later so it is developing more immediate plans to get its products or ingredients on supermarket shelves such as nutritional productions for infants or the elderly that are much more expensive than the average price of milk.

Lin said TurtleTree is exploring contracting with existing food companies to put its lab version of lactoferrin in their products or co-branding a joint product.

TurtleTree also has several competitors who are trying to produce cell-based milk including an Israeli company, Wilk Technologies. The company has gone public and received $2 million funding from Coca-Cola in Israel.

While the $40 million in initial funding will allow TurtleTree to continue its research and development for several years, Lin said more funding is essential to the company's long-term vision of producing environmentally friendly, sustainable milk products.

She hopes that food products expected to be introduced in the marketplace next year will demonstrate to investors that a new funding round is in order.

"We are trying to set ourselves up for success," she said.