The quest to create meat without the need for animal agriculture continues.

Israeli researchers are reporting a new technique to ‘build’ meat grown in a laboratory using 3D scaffolds from soy protein.

The scaffold enables cultured cells to grow into a beef-like product for human consumption that performs well in preliminary taste tests.

Shulamit Levenberg and colleagues were able to ‘seed’ bovine satellite cells within the textured soy protein scaffolds where they multiplied and created tissue, covering a large portion of the scaffolds.

They also found that co-culture with bovine smooth muscle cells and tri-culture with bovine endothelial cells improved the development of extracellular macromolecules, thus creating an enhanced meat-like texture.

Volunteers tested the product after cooking and reported that its taste, aroma, and texture were typical of ‘real’ meat.

The authors say they are developing the tools for cultured meat to be scaled up to generate new protein sources for human consumption and help reduce reliance on animal agriculture.

The study is accessible here.