Meat ranching on the Moon

[mlorrey]

We still are not talking about transmission within species, you keep changing the subject. We are talking about INDIVIDUALs eating vat grown meat that is grown FROM THEIR OWN PERSONAL CELLS. If the individual doesn't have prions to start with, they can't catch them from themselves. If they spontaneously develop them, they will only be eating themselves, not infecting others. <br /><br />"All mammals have prion proteins, the highest levels of which are present in the brain, explains Cashman, a senior scientist at Sunnybrook and Women's Research Institute and a neurologist in the Department of Medicine at Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Sciences Centre. Mammals can contract prion diseases by ingesting abnormal or infectious prions."<br /><br />Ergo, if you do not have a genetic predisposition to a prion disease, you can only catch one from eating the meat of an organism that does have that genetic predisposition or is already infected.

 

[yevaud]

<i>Correct me if I'm wrong (again), <b>but I thought the prion diseases came out of the digestion of same-species meat</b>. The protiens are recombined and eventually produce some of the dangerous, self-replicating prions.</i><br /><br />Which was posted by JO5H - which was who I was responding to. And I was answering his point about same-species ingestion of tainted (e.g. malformed Prion-bearing) meat. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[mlorrey]

Humans can apparently get prion diseases from beef and sheep, so species is not a barrier to prion transmission. You've watched too many X-files episodes.

 

[yevaud]

And neither did I state that this could not be transmitted across species lines.<br /><br />If you're going to "yell" at me, at least have your facts straight, please.<br /><br /><i>Scrapie, BSE, Creuzfeld-Jakob, all the same disease...</i><br /><br />So I even mention the manifestation of this in other species, don't I? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[chriscdc]

Ok everyone. Prions share the same protein composition as the 'normal' form of the protein. Prions however are a missfolded form of the normal protein. These miss-folded proteins are special in that they catalyse the change of the normal protein into the prion form. As you can imagine, this is extremely rare but it is originally spontaneous (as far as anyone knows) also no genetic disposition.<br /><br />You do not get prions from simple cannabalism. If however you get many individuals eating flesh from an individual that just happens to have the prion then it can infect many. <br />Cannabalism is more risky simply due to the near identical forms of the normal protein. BSE happened as the Human and Cattle are both almost identical. Simply very, very bad luck.<br /><br />Thus eating your own flesh will not increase your risk (well more mass thus more options for miss-folding but this is negligable).

 

[mlorrey]

Exactly. Otherwise, every nail, hair, nose and scab picker and eater on Earth would have long ago succumbed to prion diseases...

 

[spacefire]

Let's start a company called: "Eat u'r self!"<br />people send samples of their cells, we cultivate them and grow them in the lab,and overnight them a flesh slab of meat similar to theirs!<br />This would be a hit with cannibal cults. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>http://asteroid-invasion.blogspot.com</p><p>http://www.solvengineer.com/asteroid-invasion.html </p><p> </p> </div>

 

[mlorrey]

"Eat-U-Up!", "My Rib Shack", aw, better yet: you've heard of Tofu, this would be Youfu!!!<br /><br />I'll note this past year at Dartmouth College, an arts major put on an art show that included "food" that was human "flavored", which he called "Hu-Fu".<br /><br />I like "Youfu". It's catchy, pokes fun at the vegans. <br /><br />Now, we could also have "Celebrity Meat", where celebrities could sell the right to produce and market meat grown from their flesh, certified Mad Cow Free (i.e. no Denny Crane Sirloins). Imagine being able to buy a breast of Pamela Anderson, a flank of J-Lo, Schwartzenegger biceps, Tony Little thighs, Oprah-hocks, fillets of Jessica Simpson.... with a light Chianti...thp thp thp thp... <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" />

 

[chriscdc]

But think of all the silicone it would contain.

 

[tap_sa]

Fast-forward to ~2030, first manned Mars mission touches down on the red planet. There's some Buzz Aldrin Jr onboard who wants to celeberate the event by holding first Communion on Mars. Out of bread he picks up a some vat-meat, begins to hand it to the crew and utters; "the body of CDR ... the body of CDR ... the body of CDR ..."<br /><br />What? You didn't like that? Well ... eat me! <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" />

 

[Swampcat]

Speaking of eating human meat on Mars...wasn't this part of the "grok" idea with Michael Valentine Smith from Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land?" Or am I confusing things? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <font size="3" color="#ff9900"><p><font size="1" color="#993300"><strong><em>------------------------------------------------------------------- </em></strong></font></p><p><font size="1" color="#993300"><strong><em>"I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."</em></strong></font></p><p><font size="1" color="#993300"><strong>Thomas Jefferson</strong></font></p></font> </div>

 

[j05h]

>"Spontaneous Generation"? Gimme a break, that absurd idea went out with the middle ages. If your body is producing "malformed proteins" it is doing so naturally as a consequence of your own DNA genome, and your immune system is grown to recognise your own proteins as natural, because for you personally, they are not 'malformed'. <br /><br />Yes, spontaneuous generation, not parthenogenesis. We are talking about protien folding during digestion, not the creation of life. Spontaneous generation of a slighlty malformed protien that looks (to your body) just like regular protiens. The only difference is they poke little holes in your brain and are self-replicating, again by fooling the body into thinking it's something else. The immune system not reacting to prions as a threat is the whole point! <br /><br />Now, to the other people who passed Biology Class, can prion disease arise spontaneously from consuming your own flesh in quantity? It sounds like some individuals are more susceptible to bad-prion generation, but would several years of J05H-burgers turn me into a downer? No one has answered this fully, the pages I had time to read indicate a tenative yes, because at some point the recombination of your own protiens will catch up with you. <br /><br />A couple of non-BSE thoughts: if you could grow test-tube meat, it would be very easy to make meat-extrusions. Burger/sausage meat is going to be very easy. Growing meat like this allows for other interesting species: worm meat (very simple), dinosaur/extinct critters and as above Celebrity Steaks. You could grow meat around other food, a beef layer over rabbit or Alpaca with a hot chili core. You could even grow layers of meat in forms, or onto the plate. Brings a whole new flavor to taco salad.<br /><br />From a technical aspect, vat-grown meat sounds like a much different tech than current organ-growing attempts. I'm not sure if it'd be possible to use the same equipment to grow your new arm (or spleen) as to grow foo <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div align="center"><em>We need a first generation of pioneers.</em><br /></div> </div>

 

[josh_simonson]

I don't think people would eat it unless it was considerably cheaper than regular meat. OTOH, it's less nasty than chorizo (read the label). <br /><br />Fact is, alot of livestock are raised on land that can't be used for other purposes. Here in CA cows are kept on land that's too hilly and rocky to be cultivated. In MN and WI dairy farms are located in areas where the climate can't grow corn or soybeans. Livestock also consumes alot of waste from other processes, such as soy beans after extracting soy oil, ect. Livestock waste (manure, bone and blood) is used to fertilize the organic crops that the vegetarians hold in such high regard. Leather, hair (paintbrush bristles), bonemeal, glue, and many other products come from animals and that these will always be useful too.<br /><br />In space use I'd expect a fast breeding and growing organisms like daphnia or brine shrimp to be genetically modified to be healthy and taste good. Until there's luxurious amounts of space available for farming more traditional things, they'll have to stick with organisms with a fast life cycle that are nearly 100% edible. It seems like it'd be easier to take an existing hardy organism and engineer it to be great food, than to take great food and come up with a way to make it grow 1000s of times faster in a simple, lightweight aparatus with easy to make feedstock. <br /><br />Just a few days ago I read about GM pigs that produce omega-5 fatty acid like salmon, instead of heart clogging ones. That's where we're going, not vat-meat.

 

[j05h]

>Just a few days ago I read about GM pigs that produce omega-5 fatty acid like salmon, instead of heart clogging ones. That's where we're going, not vat-meat.<br /><br />Yes. My own view is that we will grow "ocean" ecologies with the salty waters we mine around the solar system. It is a lot easier to melt a comet and seed it than to build a giga-ton class meat-printer. Instead of worrying about building food, we will set life loose in semi-wild water repositories and harvest at will. These waters will be the reservoirs that guilds and cities draw on, fueling inner solar-system development. It will prove vastly productive, we will carry our own seas while we sail the stars. <br /><br />Josh <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div align="center"><em>We need a first generation of pioneers.</em><br /></div> </div>

 

[CalliArcale]

Any part of the central nervous system can carry disease prions. For this reason, certain cuts of meat are quite likely safe if taken from a BSE-infected steer, assuming the steer is slaughtered carefully. But buyer beware -- you may not have a way of knowing if the steer was slaughtered in a way to prevent contamination of the meat. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>

 

[mlorrey]

And vat grown meat will nave no nerves, ergo disease prions will not exist in said meat.

 

[yevaud]

Unfortunately, that's not correct. Prions (proteinaceous infectious particles) normally reside on the membranes of cells. The infectious fragments migrate along peripheral nerves to the brain where they induce nerve cell destruction. <br /><br />So regrettably, vat-grown meat will still be susceptible. Care should be taken to prevent this problem, obviously. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[josh_simonson]

Prions must have come from somewhere, a mutant animal with a genetic defect (likely short lived), a cell that was damaged by radiation - something created the first prion and they've been spreading ever since. However it seems that most cases of vCJD are contracted through eating contaiminated food, so the natural occurance of harmful prions must be much less common than bumping into one that can trace it's roots back a long way. <br /><br />As long as whatever you're cooking up wasn't contaminated by one of these prions, it's completely safe from this respect. The odds of a cell producing a prion spontaneously in our own bodies is probably similar to that of one spontaneously generating in the meat vat. <br /><br />I wouldn't worry about it unless they use cow and sheep brains to make the slurry that they feed the vat-meat.

 

[ldyaidan]

I used to play a game called "Cyberpunk" where they had done this very thing. I think it would be awesome, not only for space, but for here on earth. Especially in the areas where food production is a problem. I also see them adding in immunizations and such, since they are controlling the genetics anyway. This would mean that there would be no reason for world hunger, malnutrition, etc.. However, do you think "real" meat would still be raised and sold? Perhaps to the wealthy, as a status symbol? What about other products from these animals, such as leather?<br /><br />Rae

 

[CalliArcale]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>nfortunately, that's not correct. Prions (proteinaceous infectious particles) normally reside on the membranes of cells. The infectious fragments migrate along peripheral nerves to the brain where they induce nerve cell destruction.<br /><p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br />Yep. The prions get concentrated to dangerous levels in the central nervous system, which is why that's the dangerous stuff to consume. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>

 

[yevaud]

Yes. And there is ample evidence that the protein shape of the infectious Prions are nearly identical to "normal" Prions in the primary and secondary levels; it's at the tertiary level that non-conformality is present. <br /><br />That's why I previously made mention of the danger of same-species consumption of infected meat. At the gross level of protein shape, the immune system simply won't pick up on it, and so no immune response is initiated; it looks like a familiar protein shape.<br /><br />Someone mentioned that there is not a spontaneous generation of these infectious Prions. Apparently, that is incorrect. They <i>do</i> malform within the organism.<br /><br />However, there's a magic number of them at which it becomes an "internal pandemic," for lack of a better term. Below that level, they don't get out of hand, and the organism can accomodate them.<br /><br />Which is why the consumption of tainted meat is so dangerous. Prions are suspected to be crystalline in nature, and will alter other "good" Prions into the infectuous form. Consuming tainted meat is essentially ingesting an already huge reservoir of them. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[scottb50]

Their near indestructability leads me to think they are not biological. Maybe Prions are, Plutonium or the result of above ground Nuclear testing.<br /><br />I never heard much about Alzheimers in the 60's or 70's. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[yevaud]

Senility and age-related dementia. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[qso1]

Scottb50:<br />I never heard much about Alzheimers in the 60's or 70's.<br /><br />Me:<br />It was known then and before as senility or dementia. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[chriscdc]

The tertiary structure of a protein is their overall structure. The other structures relate to what the peptide chains amino acid sequence is then how the polypeptides fold and link to each other.<br /><br />Does the immune system actually target the prions or does it target the infected cell? IIRC the prions for BSE are expressed as membrane proteins in neurons. Then once they infect a cell the proceed to convert the normal form. The cell can't do it's job so makes more of the normal sort to keep up. The result is that the cell gets filled with prions. Any immune reaction would then be due to the cell sending out distress signals and so the immune system doesn't actually doesn't target the prions themselves.<br /><br />But I may be wrong.