Towards a More Realistic In Vitro Meat: The Cross Talk between Adipose and Muscle Cells

Abstract

According to statistics and future predictions, meat consumption will increase in the coming years. Considering both the environmental impact of intensive livestock farming and the importance of protecting animal welfare, the necessity of finding alternative strategies to satisfy the growing meat demand is compelling. Biotechnologies are responding to this demand by developing new strategies for producing meat in vitro. The manufacturing of cultured meat has faced criticism concerning, above all, the practical issues of culturing together different cell types typical of meat that are partly responsible for meat's organoleptic characteristics. Indeed, the existence of a cross talk between adipose and muscle cells has critical effects on the outcome of the co-culture, leading to a general inhibition of myogenesis in favor of adipogenic differentiation. This review aims to clarify the main mechanisms and the key molecules involved in this cross talk and provide an overview of the most recent and successful meat culture 3D strategies for overcoming this challenge, focusing on the approaches based on farm-animal-derived cells.

Keywords: cells co-culture; farm-animal-derived cells; hydrogel; in vitro meat; muscle and adipose cell cross talk; scaffold.

Figure 1

The effects of the cross talk between adipose and muscle cells. In an adipose-muscle cells co-culture, myostatin increases and activates Smad3, which blocks the activity of MyoD and the activation of myogenin (MyoG). Simultaneously, myostatin activates Atrogin1 and MurF-1, triggering proteolysis of muscle proteins. Moreover, adiponectin and C/EBP α, which are important factors of the (PPARγ) pathway, get activated and start adipogenic processes. The final effect of this cross talk is the impairment of myogenesis and a triggered adipogenesis.

Figure 2

The most recent three-dimensional co-culture approaches to meat agriculture.