When my father and I started a company to 3D print human tissues and organs, some people initially thought we were a little crazy. But since then, much progress has been made, both in our lab and other labs around the world. And given this, we started getting questions like, "If you can grow human body parts, can you also grow animal products like meat and leather?"
Kada smo moj otac i ja osnovali kompaniju kako bi štampali trodimenzionalna tkiva i organe, u početku su neki ljudi mislili da smo pomalo ludi. Ali od tada se dosta napredovalo, kako u našoj, tako i u laboratorijama širom sveta. S obzirom na ovo, počeli smo da dobijamo pitanja poput: "Ako možete uzgajati delove ljudskog tela, možete li da uzgajate životinjske proizvode poput mesa i kože?"
When someone first suggested this to me, quite frankly I thought they were a little crazy, but what I soon came to realize was that this is not so crazy after all. What's crazy is what we do today. I'm convinced that in 30 years, when we look back on today and on how we raise and slaughter billions of animals to make our hamburgers and our handbags, we'll see this as being wasteful and indeed crazy. Did you know that today we maintain a global herd of 60 billion animals to provide our meat, dairy, eggs and leather goods? And over the next few decades, as the world's population expands to 10 billion, this will need to nearly double to 100 billion animals.
Kada mi je neko to prvi put predložio, mislio sam da je ta osoba pomalo luda, ali sam uskoro shvatio da to zapravo i nije tako ludo. Ovo što danas radimo je ludo. Uveren sam da ćemo za 30 godina, kada se osvrnemo na ovo danas, kako uzgajamo i ubijamo milijarde životinja da bi pravili pljeskavice i tašne, gledati na to kao da smo bili razmetljivi i zbilja ludi. Da li ste znali da danas održavamo globalno krdo od 60 milijardi životinja za naše meso, mlečne proizvode, jaja i proizvode od kože? A u sledećih nekoliko decenija, kad svetska populacija naraste do 10 milijardi, ovaj broj će se morati skoro duplirati, na 100 milijardi životinja.
But maintaining this herd takes a major toll on our planet. Animals are not just raw materials. They're living beings, and already our livestock is one of the largest users of land, fresh water, and one of the biggest producers of greenhouse gases which drive climate change. On top of this, when you get so many animals so close together, it creates a breeding ground for disease and opportunities for harm and abuse. Clearly, we cannot continue on this path which puts the environment, public health, and food security at risk.
Ali održavanje ovog krda veliki je napor za našu planetu. Životinje nisu samo sirov materijal. One su živa bića i naša stoka već čini jednog od najvećih korisnika zemlje, sveže vode i jednog od najvećih proizvođača gasova staklene bašte koji dovode do promene klime. Povrh svega ovoga, kada spojite toliko životinja jednu blizu druge, to je plodno tle za zaraze i stvara priliku za povrede i zlostavljanje. Jasno je da ne možemo nastaviti ovim putem kojim dovodimo u opasnost životnu sredinu, zdravlje javnosti i bezbednost hrane.
There is another way, because essentially, animal products are just collections of tissues, and right now we breed and raise highly complex animals only to create products that are made of relatively simple tissues. What if, instead of starting with a complex and sentient animal, we started with what the tissues are made of, the basic unit of life, the cell?
Postoji drugi način, jer zapravo životinjski proizvodi su samo skup tkiva i mi trenutno uzgajamo veoma kompleksne životinje da bismo stvorili proizvode sačinjene od relativno jednostavnih tkiva. Šta ako bismo, umesto započinjanja sa kompleksnom i živom životinjom, započeli sa onim od čega su stvorena tkiva, osnovnom jedinicom života, ćelijom?
This is biofabrication, where cells themselves can be used to grow biological products like tissues and organs. Already in medicine, biofabrication techniques have been used to grow sophisticated body parts, like ears, windpipes, skin, blood vessels and bone, that have been successfully implanted into patients. And beyond medicine, biofabrication can be a humane, sustainable and scalable new industry.
Ovo je bioproizvodnja, gde se same ćelije mogu koristiti za stvaranje bioloških proizvoda poput tkiva i organa. Tehnike bioproizvodnje su se već koristile u medicini kako bi se proizveli sofisticirani delovi tela poput ušiju, dušnika, kože, krvnih sudova i kostiju, koji su uspešno presađeni u pacijente. I izvan medicine, bioproizvodnja može biti humana, održiva i skalabilna nova grana privrede.
And we should begin by reimagining leather. I emphasize leather because it is so widely used. It is beautiful, and it has long been a part of our history. Growing leather is also technically simpler than growing other animal products like meat. It mainly uses one cell type, and it is largely two-dimensional. It is also less polarizing for consumers and regulators. Until biofabrication is better understood, it is clear that, initially at least, more people would be willing to wear novel materials than would be willing to eat novel foods, no matter how delicious. In this sense, leather is a gateway material, a beginning for the mainstream biofabrication industry. If we can succeed here, it brings our other consumer bioproducts like meat closer on the horizon.
Treba da počnemo sa novom vizijom kože. Ističem kožu jer je toliko rasprostranjena. Prelepa je i dugo je deo naše istorije. Proizvodnja kože je takođe tehnički jednostavnija od proizvodnje drugih životinjskih proizvoda poput mesa. Uglavnom se koristi jedan tip ćelija i većinom je dvodimenzionalan. Takođe manje polarizuje potrošače i regulatore. Dok ne bude postojalo bolje razumevanje bioproizvodnje, jasno je da će, makar na početku više ljudi biti voljno da nosi nove materijale nego što će biti onih koji bi jeli novu hranu, koliko god bila ukusna. U ovom smislu, koža je polazni materijal, početak za komercijalnu industriju bioproizvodnje. Ako tu uspemo, to će približiti druge bioproizvode poput mesa.
Now how do we do it? To grow leather, we begin by taking cells from an animal, through a simple biopsy. The animal could be a cow, lamb, or even something more exotic. This process does no harm, and Daisy the cow can live a happy life. We then isolate the skin cells and multiply them in a cell culture medium. This takes millions of cells and expands them into billions. And we then coax these cells to produce collagen, as they would naturally. This collagen is the stuff between cells. It's natural connective tissue. It's the extracellular matrix, but in leather, it's the main building block. And what we next do is we take the cells and their collagen and we spread them out to form sheets, and then we layer these thin sheets on top of one another, like phyllo pastry, to form thicker sheets, which we then let mature. And finally, we take this multilayered skin and through a shorter and much less chemical tanning process, we create leather. And so I'm very excited to show you, for the first time, the first batch of our cultured leather, fresh from the lab. This is real, genuine leather, without the animal sacrifice. It can have all the characteristics of leather because it is made of the same cells, and better yet, there is no hair to remove, no scars or insect's bites, and no waste. This leather can be grown in the shape of a wallet, a handbag or a car seat. It is not limited to the irregular shape of a cow or an alligator.
Kako to uraditi? Da bismo proizveli kožu, prvo uzimamo ćelije od životinja, kroz jednostavnu biopsiju. Životinja može biti krava, jagnje ili čak nešto egzotičnije. Procesom se ne oštećuje i krava Šarulja može da nastavi da živi srećno. Onda izdvojimo ćelije kože i umnožavamo ih u sredini za kulturu ćelije. Ovo zahteva milione ćelija i umnožava ih na milijarde. Onda privolimo ove ćelije da proizvode kolagen, što bi radile prirodno. Kolagen je materija između ćelija, prirodno vezivno tkivo. To je vanćelijska matrica, ali kod kože je on glavni gradivni materijal. Onda uzimamo ćelije i njihov kolagen i širimo ih da bismo oformili listove i onda slažemo ove tanke listove jedan na drugi kao lisnato testo, kako bi stvorili deblje listove koje ostavljamo da sazru. Konačno uzimamo ovu višeslojnu kožu i kroz kraći proces štavljenja sa mnogo manje hemikalija, stvaramo kožu. Veoma sam uzbuđen da vam ovo pokažem, po prvi put, prvu turu naše veštačke kože, sveže iz laboratorije. Ovo je prava pravcata koža, bez žrtvovanja životinja. Može da ima sve karakteristike kože jer je napravljena od istih ćelija i još bolje, nema krzna za uklanjanje, nema ožiljaka ili ujeda insekata i nema otpada. Ova koža se može napraviti u obliku novčanika, torbe ili sedišta automobila. Nije ograničena na nepravilni oblik krave ili aligatora.
And because we make this material, we grow this leather from the ground up, we can control its properties in very interesting ways. This piece of leather is a mere seven tissue layers thick, and as you can see, it is nearly transparent. And this leather is 21 layers thick and quite opaque. You don't have that kind of fine control with conventional leather. And we can tune this leather for other desirable qualities, like softness, breathability, durability, elasticity and even things like pattern. We can mimic nature, but in some ways also improve upon it. This type of leather can do what today's leather does, but with imagination, probably much more.
I zato što kožu stvaramo, gajimo je od samog početka, možemo da kontrolišemo njene osobine na veoma zanimljive načine. Ovaj komad kože je tanak samo sedam slojeva, i kao što možete da vidite, skoro je providan. A ovaj komad ima 21 sloj i prilično je neproziran. Takvu vrstu fine kontrole nemate sa tradicionalnom kožom. I možemo da podešavamo ovu kožu sa drugim poželjnim osobinama poput mekoće, disanja, izdržljivosti, elastičnosti i čak i stvarima poput šare. Možemo da imitiramo prirodu ali na neki način čak i da je poboljšamo. Ova vrsta kože može da uradi isto što i današnja ali uz maštu, verovatno i mnogo više.
What could the future of animal products look like? It need not look like this, which is actually the state of the art today. Rather, it could be much more like this. Already, we have been manufacturing with cell cultures for thousands of years, beginning with products like wine, beer and yogurt. And speaking of food, our cultured food has evolved, and today we prepare cultured food in beautiful, sterile facilities like this. A brewery is essentially a bioreactor. It is where cell culture takes place. Imagine that in this facility, instead of brewing beer, we were brewing leather or meat. Imagine touring this facility, learning about how the leather or meat is cultured, seeing the process from beginning to end, and even trying some. It's clean, open and educational, and this is in contrast to the hidden, guarded and remote factories where leather and meat is produced today. Perhaps biofabrication is a natural evolution of manufacturing for mankind. It's environmentally responsible, efficient and humane. It allows us to be creative. We can design new materials, new products, and new facilities. We need to move past just killing animals as a resource to something more civilized and evolved. Perhaps we are ready for something literally and figuratively more cultured.
Kako bi mogla da izgleda budućnost životinjskih proizvoda? Ne mora da izgleda ovako, što je zapravo današnja najmodernija tehnologija. Mogla bi da izgleda više ovako. Već hiljadama godina proizvodimo sa kulturama ćelija, počev od proizvoda poput vina, piva i jogurta. Govoreći o hrani, naša hrana koju uzgajamo se razvila i danas pripremamo hranu u predivnim sterilnim postrojenjima poput ovog. Pivara je u suštini bioreaktor. Tu se odvija kultura ćelija. Zamislite da u ovom postrojenju umesto proizvodnje piva pravimo kožu ili meso. Zamislite da prolazite kroz ovo postrojenje i učite kako se stvara koža ili meso gledajući proces od početka do kraja, i čak probate nešto od toga. Čisto je, otvoreno i obrazovno, nasuprot sakrivenim udaljenim fabrikama sa čuvarima gde se danas proizvode koža i meso. Možda je bioproizvodnja prirodna evolucija proizvodnje za ljudsku rasu. Ekološki je odgovorna, efikasna i humana. Dozvoljava nam da budemo kreativni. Možemo da dizajniramo nove materijale, nove proizvode i nova postrojenja. Moramo da pređemo sa ubijanja životinja kao resursa na nešto civilizovanije i naprednije. Možda smo spremni za nešto što je bukvalno i metaforički kulturnije.
Thank you.
Hvala vam.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)