Falling Walls Falling Walls Science Summit 2021
© David Parry/PA Wire

Breaking the Wall of Industrial Farming

How lab-grown meat will transform food production

Mark Post

Engineering & Technology

For a variety of reasons ranging from our heightened awareness of climate change and concerns for our health to an increased sensitivity to animal welfare issues, the popularity of alternatives to meat has been gaining unprecedented momentum in recent years. Mark Post, who trained as a medical doctor and is now Chair of Physiology and Vice Dean of Biomedical Technology at Maastricht University, has been investigating ‘in vitro meat’ since as far back as 2008. He is widely and internationally acclaimed for having developed the world’s first hamburger bioengineered from bovine muscle stem cells in 2013, proving it is scientifically possible to create edible meat from cultured cells. Mark also serves as the Chief Scientific Officer and co-founder of Mosa Meat, a company which aims to perfect the process, reduce the costs and scale up the manufacturing of cultured meat. At Falling Walls, Mark will explain his mission to overcome the last economic and societal obstacles standing in the way of the development of tissue engineering into a technology that can mass-produce affordable meat with out harming animals or the environment, leading to a far more sustainable food system as well as health benefits for humans.

Mark Post

Maastricht University

Mark Post is Chair of Physiology and Vice Dean of Biomedical Technology at Maastricht University. He is trained as a Medical Doctor and has been investigating ‘in vitro meat’ since 2008. He is widely and internationally acclaimed for having created the world’s first hamburger bioengineered from bovine muscle stem cells in 2013, proving it is scientifically possible to create an edible beef burger from cultured cells. Mark also serves as the Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder of MosaMeat, a company which aims to develop tissue engineering into a technology that can mass-produce affordable meat without harming animals, leading not only to health benefits but to a far more sustainable food system in the future.

Connected Content

The Future of Meat Does Not Involve Killing Animals
Mark Post

Mark Post knows how to make beef, but he is no butcher. He very much prefers his laboratory to the slaughterhouse. As the chair of Physiology and Vice Dean of Biomedical Technology at Maastricht University, Post has dedicated the most recent decade of his life to creating meat without actually killing animals – so called cultured or in vitro meat. Although Post has been working on lab-grown meat for years, his research could hardly happen at a better time. Recently,…
Further Activities to have a look at