There have been a lot of articles about lab-grown meat lately, but none of them have solved the big problem in the space: fetal bovine serum.<p>FBS is widely used for cell cultures in laboratories, but I as far as I'm aware, this is the first time that it's used as an industrial process for consumer products (although maybe it's used in commercial pharma, I don't know). FBS extraction is a "slaughterhouse" technology, so these new products don't yet move us any closer to the goal of ending industrial animal slaughter. In fact, this could actually be a step in the wrong direction.<p>I've kept an eye on this space for a while, and there have been plenty of announcements of artificial FBS, but none of them have ever been able to offer any proof, just vapor.<p>If a company comes along with a synthetic plant-derived alternative to FBS, and they can actually prove it works, invest heavily. They're the ones who will change the world.<p>EDIT: Good news! I found there is now a commercially available FBS alternative called 'FastGro'. It is very expensive - $264.60 per 100ml - and it doesn't say how it's made, but hey, it's a start.<p>It's also worth checking out their brochure just because of how hilarious and awesome the art is: <a href="https://media.mpbio.com/document/file/brochure/dest/l/s/1/0/2/LS102019-EN-FastGro-Brochure.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://media.mpbio.com/document/file/brochure/dest/l/s/1/0/...</a>