Ouroboros Steak grow-your-own human meat kit is "technically" not cannibalism

A group of American scientists and designers have developed a concept for a grow-your-own steak kit using human cells and blood to question the ethics of the cultured meat industry. Ouroboros Steak could be grown by the diner at home using their own cells, which are harvested from the inside of their cheek and fed serum derived from expired, donated blood. The resulting bite-sized pieces of meat, currently on display as prototypes at the Beazley Designs of the Year exhibition, are created entirely without causing harm to animals. The creators argued this cannot be said about the growing selection of cultured meat made from animal cells. Despite the lab-grown meat industry claiming to offer a more sustainable, cruelty-free alternative to factory farming, the process still relies on fetal bovine serum (FBS) as a protein-rich growth supplement for animal cell cultures. FBS, which costs around £300 to £700 per litre, is derived from the blood of calf fetuses after their pregnant mothers are slaughtered by the meat or dairy industry. So lab-grown meat remains a byproduct of polluting agricultural practices, much like regular meat. "Fetal bovine serum costs significant amounts of money and the lives of animals," said scientist Andrew Pelling, who developed the Ouroboros Steak with industrial designer Grace Knight and artist and researcher Orkan Telhan. Ouroboros Steak, named after the ancient symbol of the snake eating its own tail, cuts out the need for other animals by drawing exclusively on human blood and cells. The version on display at London's Design Museum was made using human cell cultures, which can be purchased for research and development purposes from the American Tissue Culture Collection (ATCC). They were fed with human serum derived from expired blood donations that would otherwise have been discarded or incinerated...MORE