SpaceX: Can meat be grown in space?

Image source, Getty Images

Both Bezos and Musk want to colonise space. People are being put on the surface of Mars.

What will humans eat if they set up communities on the moon or planets?

Plants can flourish in space, so many experiments have been conducted.

A new test has begun to see if meat cells can grow.

It was a small step for trialling a potential source of food in space.

The experiment was dreamt up by an Israeli company that grows meat from cells and is being carried out by the first all-private team to visit the International Space Station.

Sceptics say the method is too unstable for astronauts to rely on, and that growing space meat will never be more simple than simply bringing it up from Earth.

Growing meat from cells is difficult on Earth. One of the companies trying to produce cultured meat is the first to try to do it in space.

The company doesn't like to use the term "lab-grown" meat, but in reality this process doesn't look like a traditional farm.

The cells from a cow are fed the things they need to grow. You can eat meat that you can eat. This process is called cultivation.

The meat is grown in tanks that look more like a brewery than a farmyard. The life-cycle of an animal raised for meat is completely bypassed.

Image source, Aleph Farms

Enthusiasts say the process could have positive implications for the environment.

Scientists don't know if this can be replicated in zero gravity.

We know from previous scientific studies that biology and physiology behave differently in a microgravity environment, so we don't know if these processes of meat proliferation can actually occur in space.

On the first private mission to the International Space Station, the four men brought with them a small shoe box-sized container that they needed to grow animal cells.

Michael Lopez-Alegria and Mark Pathy were among those who launched from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The cells will be analysed after they return to space on April 24.

Even if the experiment is a success and it is proven that meat can be grown in space, it doesn't mean it's a good idea.

Local supermarkets aren't stuffed with meat grown from cells. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been invested in the industry, but this is food that is hard to produce at scale.

Regulatory approval in Israel is needed before it can serve it at restaurants. This is food that has yet to establish itself on Earth.

There are more practical problems when it comes to growing meat in space. The issue of sterility is the first.

David Humbird is a chemical engineer at Berkeley.

If the culture was to be colonized bybacteria or fungus, it would grow much faster from animal cells and you wouldn't have to make animal cells anymore. You are making something. Mr Humbird says you have to throw it away.

In space, where relatively small quantities of meat would need to be produced, the sterility problem can be solved. It would be disastrous for a community on Mars to be contaminated.

Image source, Aleph Farms

It is argued that transporting food into space is very expensive. The cost to get a pound of payload into Earth's orbit was put at $10,000 by a Nasa estimate in 2008.

It would cost a lot more to bring a pound of food to Mars.

Mars is millions of kilometres away. It is a huge advantage to be able to produce your food on site.

Mr Humbird does not agree with this potential benefit.

The cells that are grown on food are going to be a lot of different things. The cells that you make will have less calories than that.

If you can recover 25% of the calories, you can eat them as food. Why would you drag all those calories into space just to get 75% of them?

The mental health of astronauts is one of the considerations when planning long space missions.

Karen is a former Nasa Astronaut who spent five-and-a-half months on the International Space Station and is now on the advisory board.

She says food is important in the psychological wellbeing of a crew.

I was craving the smell of garlic saute and olive oil, and it was just something we don't have, because food comes in these white bags that we just have to hydration, like powdered milk. I think it would be great if we could bring anything back home.

If humans are expected to be away from earth for a long time, fresh food and vegetables are important.

If humans are serious about putting people on Mars, how to feed them with food that tastes good is an important and difficult dilemma.

It is one thing to show that meat can be grown in space, but another to show that it is reliable enough and practical.

It's important for the company to show that meat can be produced at scale on Earth.

James is based in San Francisco. You can follow him on social media.