When you hear the word fermentation, what comes to mind is the rising bread, and the making of Beer. Humans have been using this technique for a very long time and it became a big deal especially in food creation since the era of civilization.
When microorganisms go through the process of fermentation, they do this for their survival. They break down sugar such as glucose into smaller blocks so as to produce energy for themselves but since we are humans with brains that keeps innovating, we have been able to use both the microbes and its byproduct for our daily needs.
In food production, fermentation can be of three types including Lactic acid fermentation which is what we use in the production of pickles, that popular yogurt you drink, and Sourdough bread, Alcohol Fermentation used for beer, and wine production, and the third being Acetic Acid Fermentation used to make things like vinegar.
Fermentation has done a lot in the food industry including helping in food production for vegans such as the fermentation of Soybeans into Tempeh which is a meat alternative. We have also been able to utilize the microbes themselves for ourselves instead of their byproducts. This is seen in Whole Mass Fermentation where we eat the microbes themselves such as in the case of mycoprotein from fungi, but we are about to take fermentation to another level which is the production of meat.
It isn't like we haven't used microbes and their fermentation that much, we have also used them in Precision fermentation where we make microbes to produce the enzymes and proteins available in animal. This can be found in companies like Perfect day who take genomic sequences that code for Beta Lactoglobulin (a WheyProtein) into a fungus,thereby causing it to produce whey that is free from antibiotics that could have been found in it if gotten from animals.
With precision fermentation, we are able to make all types of molecules that are part of many animal products including cheese and eggs, as well as to produce compounds like Heme which is what impossible foods use to giver their plant-based burger the animal meaty taste as well as bleed.
Talking about using fermentation to create meat; cell based agriculture aims at creating meat by growing animal cells outside of the animal where samples from the animal is taken to the lab and proliferated into meats such as Steaks. Fermentation could be used to keep the animal cells thriving during the proliferation process. This isn't going to be easy, and it would be costly, also a lot of things needs to be put into consideration including the fact that animal meats possesses collagen and fibronectic which would hold lab grown cells together to create the meat feeling we would expect but this is not possible yet. A lot of work needs to be done and until then, we are just going to keep eating our meat and meat products.
Some of you would say you aren't going to buy alternative proteins like fermentation made steak and so on but it would not be good to judge so soon since it is yet to become a reality, and currently, we depend on fermentation for fermentation-based products, so there is a high chance that we would receive these types of food products with open arms when we are able to have a breakthrough.
Post Reference
https://www.forbes.com/sites/briankateman/2021/06/07/fermentation-the-new-game-changer-for-alternative-proteins/?sh=326361aa3aff
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/11/fermentation-can-help-build-a-more-efficient-and-sustainable-food-system-here-s-how/
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/01/220107084417.htm
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10991178/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7823516/
https://www.mdpi.com/2311-5637/6/4/106
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK234703/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6117990/
https://gfi.org/science/the-science-of-fermentation/
https://agfundernews.com/what-is-precision-fermentation-trade-associations-nail-down-definition
https://www.foodbusinessnews.net/articles/25553-the-future-is-now-for-precision-fermentation
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/food-science/fermented-meat-products
