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Biotech Science

Jacket Grown from Living Tissue 103

Posted by timothy from the what-about-victimless-filet-mignon dept.
RangerRick98 writes "Wired has a story about growing jackets from living tissue. The jacket is grown using "a biodegradable polymer as a base," a coating of 3T3 mouse cells (which apparently continue to grow and split even after being removed from their host), and human bone cells for rigidity. The jacket grown so far is only about 2 x 1.4 inches. The hope is that when the polymer degrades, the jacket will retain its structure. The focus behind this work is 'victimless' leather."
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Jacket Grown from Living Tissue More

Jacket Grown from Living Tissue

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  • "Victimless leather"?!? (Score:5, Funny)

    by El ( 94934 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:17AM (#10504055)
    Why don't scientists instead concentrate on breeding a cow that enjoys being eaten and having it's skin made into leather goods?

  • Prior Art (Score:2, Informative)

    by phauxfinnish ( 698087 )
    I'm calling prior art [wikipedia.org].

  • Speechless...... (Score:4, Funny)

    by p4ul13 ( 560810 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:19AM (#10504070) Homepage
    My first thoughts were "ok, that's pretty freaking disturbing", but then I realized I own a leather jacket, belts, gloves, and boots.

    My second thoughts were "Hmm, I wonder how I'd look in a mouse coat".

  • Anyone working on extra-victimized leather yet? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:19AM (#10504077)
    I'm thinking: same technology, but keep the jacket tissue alive, and stick some nerve cells and audio production equipment in there somewhere.

    Imagine how many PETA heads you could explode if your jacket cried out in pain when you busted a seam or whimpered with hunger if you hadn't spilled any food on it recently.

  • Save the cows. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by hoggoth ( 414195 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:25AM (#10504131) Journal
    > The focus behind this work is 'victimless' leather

    This is great news. Hopefully someday soon we can grow all of our leather clothing. Once we attain that proud accomplishment we can then dump the remains of cows slaughtered for meat in a landfill instead of using their hides for clothing.

    • Nonsense! Before then we'll have "victimless meat" where we take and clone cattle muscle cells into hordes of artificial steaks...

      I'm sorry but killing things to eat them is natural, it's what we do. Using the left-overs as clothing is just good economic sense. I've always been impressed by the Lapps, who use virtually every part of the reindeer they slaughter. Ironically, one of the reindeer bones is used to make a lassoo, which is used to catch reindeer... :)
      • Killing to eat is natural.

        So is procreating as prodigiously as possible.

        As is killing to protect territory.

        Oh yeah, and stealing from another that has something you need.

        Not to mention a host of other things.

        Does being natural make it -right- once you have a brain and base of knowledge capable of overcoming the need? Nope.

        Note that I'm not saying we should all be vegetarians (though eating less meat would help most of us). However I -am- saying we should support finding a way to create meat that did n
        • So you'd like for us to grow steak in the lab to save the environment?

          Lets consider that.

          The steak cells would require just as much energy to grow in a lab as elsewhere. Thing is we haven't quite caught up with nature in the energy efficency stakes (sorry, sorry) so this would require more energy than feeding a cow.

          Furthermore, while the cow, at no extra cost, turns sunlight into steak via grass, our process would probably require us to harvest some cereal, process it, extract the relevant nutrien
          • With the direction we're going right now, artificial steak is the ONLY way. Don't like it? Neither do I. I'm a bit of a pessimist when it comes to human nature, though, so I'm assuming our population explosion is not going to slow down.

            I also think that a nice, bland, mass produced artificial steak could be far more efficient to produce than a "real" steak. With sufficiently advanced technology, it might not even be bland. Unlike a Steak-O-Vat, a real cow expends a lot of energy on things other than gr

          • I disagree. Sure, today's methods would be energy intensive, but for comparison look at solar today compared with the 1970's. In other words, things get more efficient the more you research them. We're nowhere close to 100% efficiency with solar but we're 10 times more efficient than we were.

            Take a look at a pound of steak. The cow had to be at least 1 year old (I think it's usually closer to 2 years) to get to market. That cow didn't miraculously turn 1 season of grain into that pound ... it took between
            • I will definately agree that our dietry habits need adjusting.

              It feels too cheeky to say that we have to live naturally, but our current intake of steak is unnatural, so I won't.

              And I cede that cows are incredibly inefficient systems, and all the energy they expend respiring, digesting, walking, and farting (which, if the numbers are to be believed, they must do a lot of) means it's probable an artificial steak could be created more efficiently.

              Here's to the happy middle ground!

      • Re:Save the cows. (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Which part of the deer are you using to post right now?
      • And what would be wrong with the cloned meat, provided it can have the same flavor/nutrition/etc as real meat?

        I accept that we kill cows for food and clothing, but making them without cows has benefits too. It could take up a lot less space for instance.

        As for some PETA-inspired dream of setting the cows free in the wild... I'm sure humans aren't the only ones who find them slow and tasty.

        • Re:Save the cows. (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Noofus ( 114264 ) *
          I eat meat with nearly every meal, and own a few leather jackets of varying weights for the different seasons. I do not have a problem with killing an animal to "use" it. Since life on earth seems to be structured this way, its fine with me. But if there is a way to honestly 'grow' leather and meat that didnt require killing an animal, I would be first in line. Assuming of course all the flavor of the meat is retained, and all the warmth, feel, smell of leather is still there.

          Presumably this would free
          • Assuming of course all the flavor of the meat is retained, and all the warmth, feel, smell of leather is still there.

            The smell is from the process of turning skin into leather, not from the animal itself...
      • Reminds me of the "Real Meat(TM)" factory you are investgating in Project Eden.
    • That was my first thought. We're growing cattle for their meat anyway - if we can't or won't use the leather (a byproduct of the cow) it would just go to waste.
      • None of you actually know if the cows in question are "dual purpose" or not.

        I'm pretty sure meat-cows and milk-cows are mutually exclusive. I don't know myself where leather cows come in, but it may very well be that they are special cows that we don't eat. Go read wikipedia or something... (NOTE: I am not taking my own advice since I really don't care.)

        • Meat cows and milk cows generally are mutually exclusive, except that when milk cows are used for meat, they go to McDonalds :)

          I'm pretty sure that most cows wear a leather coat (we'll call it "cowhide"), regardless of if they're a milk cow or a meat cow. If that cow is for any reason slaughtered, the "cowhide" may as well be used.

          • Interesting about McDonalds! Are you serious?
            • Sure - but I'm pretty positive I was making that part up.

              Cattle raised for meat are generally slautered fairly young. Cattle raised for milk are much longer lived, and their meat is tougher than that found in your average meat cow - so it's a lower grade meat. If it's used, it's used in burgers - and who makes lower grade burgers than McDonalds?

          • IANARedneck, but there are quite a few versatile breeds, mostly rustic ones, like the Salers [okstate.edu] that can be bred for both. Their meat is excellent, and the milk is also used for making a couple of the best kinds of french cheese. Of course, I'm neither talking of McDo meat non-quality nor of living tasteless milk factories here...
        • I had heard that the reason for the currently high prices in dairy products was due to milk cows being converted to meat cows in response to the mad cow disease panic.

          Of course, it may just be due to the cost of shipping rising as fuel prices soar. But I haven't noticed other things get proportionately more expensive as dairy products.

      • Re:Save the cows. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by blincoln ( 592401 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @02:25PM (#10506160) Homepage Journal
        We're growing cattle for their meat anyway - if we can't or won't use the leather (a byproduct of the cow) it would just go to waste.

        Growing cattle en masse for meat is one of the worst possible things that can be done for the environment. It contributes to global warming through greenhouse gases, wastes agricultural space by growing feed and using water that could go to humans instead, et cetera.

        A lot of cattle are even raised at the expense of rainforests, because people in e.g. South America will slash and burn e.g. the Amazon to make places to raise them.

        The main reason that the meat industry is profitable is because they are able to sell so many by-products to be used in so many other ways - leather, gelatin, and so on. If, for example, cheaper vat-grown alternatives were used, I expect that meat prices would increase dramatically, and maybe Americans would end up eating food that is actually good for them and the planet instead of clogging up their arteries and digestive tract and helping to ensure the doom of the biosphere.

        I would buy one of these jackets in a second if they were available commercially, but in the meantime I've found that Vegetarian Shoes [vegetarian-shoes.co.uk]' synthetic material lasts longer than the real thing anyway.
        • What am I doing for the environment?

          I'M EATING THE COW!

          But i'm only one man...

          I dunno man, greenhouse gasses from cow farts vs polymer jackets and corn thats the same color when I shit it back out. Damn, now I'm hungry!

        • I expect that meat prices would increase dramatically, and maybe Americans would end up eating food that is actually good for them
          There's nothing unhealthy about meat, there is something unhealthy about eating too much saturated fat or an unbalanced diet. I really wish the vegetarians and vegans would stop lying to us and implicating meat as some sort of unhealthy food. I've known vegans who deep fry everything as if that's "healthy".

          If you want to have your fuzzy huggable lovable animal beliefs, fine
    • Don't be silly. If we can make a mouse skin and human bone jacket, surely we can make meat grow in vats too or better yet, on trees. Not necessarily just beef either...

      Obligatory quote:
      Fry: Oh my God! What if the secret ingredient... is people!
      Leela: No, they already have a drink like that: Soylent Cola.
      Fry: Oh. How is it?
      Leela: It varies from person to person.

    • Re:Save the cows. (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      On the plus side, if everyone wears human skin clothing, that guy in The Silence of the Lambs will seem less crazy and more fashionable.

  • How is this victimless? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Oliver Wendell Jones ( 158103 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:30AM (#10504174)
    I'm going to have to lose a ton of weight to fit into a 2" x 1.4" jacket...

  • I'd like to wear .... (Score:3, Funny)

    by oever ( 233119 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:35AM (#10504224) Homepage
    [fill in person]

    • Mmmm... I'd like to wear Vera Wang. She's hot. And suddenly I find I'm not too interested in wearing any Calvin Klein or Tommy Hillfigger. Wait a minute. Would that be straight or crossdressing?

      The only thing I can say for sure is, the Devil wears Prada.

  • Life (Score:2, Insightful)

    by delta_avi_delta ( 813412 )
    The artists claim to be making a point about our loose and casual attitude to life, by making us aware that we casually wear dead things.

    I find it extraordinarily creepy that these people would criticise our attitude to life by combining mouse skin cells and human bone cells into a living coat. I find this manipulation of living things far more disrespectful to our environment, and all things living than harvesting the hide of dead cattle.
    • Not sure why, but I am picturing the uber-mouse-evil-scientist from that Farscape episode explaining that this is a good idea...

    • Re:Life (Score:3, Interesting)

      by blincoln ( 592401 )
      I find this manipulation of living things far more disrespectful to our environment, and all things living than harvesting the hide of dead cattle.

      You find it less disrespectful to have something killed for your own benefit than to wear something that was grown in a lab? I find *that* extraordinarily creepy.

      You are covered by and host to millions of things that are more alive than this coat. How is that any different?
      • Don't misunderstand me, it's not the fact that it was grown in a lab, or that it's alive - it's the cavelier attitude to life, the universe, and everything that spawned the idea, and then the arrogance that produced the product.

        As has arisen in the post numerously, killing is natural. Combining skin and bone cells to grow a coat is not. Maybe I have an overly microscopic focus on this,

        • Re:Life (Score:5, Insightful)

          by blincoln ( 592401 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @03:37PM (#10507113) Homepage Journal
          As has arisen in the post numerously, killing is natural. Combining skin and bone cells to grow a coat is not.

          Dying at age 30 because you live in a mud hut with no healthcare and drink from a river that is used for waste disposal is natural.

          Prolonging your life to 80 years or older through the use of pharmaceuticals and medical care is not.

          Having twelve children of which more than half die off is natural.

          Using birth control to limit or eliminate offspring altogether is not.

          Humans consuming every possible resource until they've laid waste to the land like a plague of locusts is natural.

          Consciously choosing to limit the use of unnecessary resources to benefit the other species on the planet is not.

          We are not a natural species anymore; we are a technologically-augmented race. Growing things in a lab is just an extension of what we've been doing for the last few centuries. There are too many of us to live in a "natural" way, and the vast majority of us wouldn't want to if we really knew what it meant.
          • Well said, and I'm going to have to concede to you on all but one point:

            Humans consuming every possible resource is unnatural, and is an ability given to us by our technical augmentation (sorry to borrow, but it's elegant).

            In general "uncivilised", which could mean "untechnical", peoples live (or lived, this is a dying phenomena) in symbiosis with their environment.

            While technology has given us the chance to live past 30, and choose how we have our offspring, a side effect of all this choice has be

  • Intresting science, but of questionable use. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LordZardoz ( 155141 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:38AM (#10504261)
    As one poster already pointed out, its not like we slaughter cows just to wear their skins, and toss the rest of the cow in a landfill. Its not like it really improves the cows outlook once it reaches the slaughter house.

    Even if this ends up being more economically viable then using cow hides, this will still offend those who view this kind of science as an abomination. Instead of slaughtering cows for their skins, were now tinkering in 'gods' playground, pissing around with the building blocks of life.

    And the sort of person who complains about using leather is also likely to be the sort that complains about genetically modified foods.

    END COMMUNICATION
    • I keep getting flashes of that Sapphire & Steel episode where the house from the future has returned to study the 20th century and weirdness starts happening with angry animals.
    • And the sort of person who complains about using leather is also likely to be the sort that complains about genetically modified foods.

      And that, my friend, is the key. It's all about the kind of person you are, and very little about the issue at hand, be it vegetarian food or artificially grown leather. It's fashion, not logic that drives most people. Hell, a few posts up somebody (5 insightful) was ranting on how unhealthy beef is, and i doubt ter percent of slashdot readers ever bothered to research
    • Flame me if you will, but, the idea that technological advancement/research is somehow "playing God" is asinine. If you assume that God is an (the) omnipotent, omniscient controller of the universe, how can we possibly do anything that He doesn't want/allow us to do? It may be a bad idea to pursue biotech; bad for the planet, bad for our species, etc..., but it is not something that we have somehow stolen from God. When we start creating the universe, breathing life into things, and know and control ever

  • You know... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by SLiK812 ( 518195 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:46AM (#10504348)
    When this is all said and done, and there will be no more innocent animal victims, but the planet is going to be the victim of overpopulation from animals, letting off CO2 and methane.

    Yes, it's important that we don't kill off all animals, and yes it's important that they're treated humanely, but my lunch and winter wear is darned important too! Not to mention the ability to live on a safe and hospitable planet.

    Jiminy jillikers people.

    • Re:You know... (Score:2, Interesting)

      by arashi no garou ( 699761 )
      I am as much an animal lover as anyone, probably more than some. I just wonder where some of the more extreme PETA people get the idea that it's "wrong" to kill an animal for food or clothing. Humans are as much animals as any other creature on this earth, and you don't see PETA freaks lobbying to stop lions from killing gazelles for meat. Also, you never hear them talk about indigenous tribes in Africa and South America for whom hunting and skinning is an integral part of their society and ecology. I guess

  • missing the point (Score:4, Insightful)

    by nusratt ( 751548 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:46AM (#10504352) Journal
    "We're growing cattle for their meat anyway, why waste the leather?"

    1. Every additional consumer purchase contributes to the economic viability of the producer.
    EVEN IF you disagree with the animal rights activists, this is simple math.

    2. Instead of asking, "Why waste the leather after the slaughter?", how about asking, why not use this process to *replace* the need for slaughter, i.e. why not work toward making this process an economically feasible substitute for producing meat?
    • 2. Because I don't think a cow suffers?
    • why not work toward making this process an economically feasible substitute for producing meat?

      Because we have an economically feasible meat source. Cows. It's worked for thousands of years.
      • Uh, no.

        Cows are _not_ "an economically feasible meat source." At least, not in the volumes that we evil Americans are gobbling them up - there is a reason all the rain forests are disappearing. From an economic and ecological standpoint, it takes far more space and energy to get a beef burger than, say, a few chicken nuggets.
    • 2. Instead of asking, "Why waste the leather after the slaughter?", how about asking, why not use this process to *replace* the need for slaughter, i.e. why not work toward making this process an economically feasible substitute for producing meat?

      Ok, the cruelty to animals argument I can see. I don't particularly like the idea of slaughtering animals, but I can live with myself and still eat meat.

      The argument that is more moving for me is the one of sutstainability. We often hear quoted figures on
      • The argument that is more moving for me is the one of sutstainability. We often hear quoted figures on how many lbs of a given plant crop go into producing each lb of beef you buy at the store, or a comparison of how much energy goes into producing a lb of beef versus a lb of, say, soy. I don't have numbers in front of me, but suffice it to say that meat is an extremely inefficient food source- a fact that is very important in a hungry world with limited resources.

        Just to make a point... The "energy pyram

      • The problem of world hunger is not one of production - it is a problem of efficient distribution. Eastern Washington can grow enough wheat to feed the world. One year of food production in the United States alone could flod the world food market. They don't do this because they can't move the wheat into the people's mouths.

        One of the reasons why we can walk into any supermarket in America and find foods from around the world at cutthroat low prices is because we pay the middleman to move the product from t
    • I am reminded of an Arthur C Clarke story, written as an address to the planetary government. The speaker was the president of a food company which was going bankrupt in a future where all food was synthesised, and it considered horribly offensive to discuss the consumption of dead flesh.

      So, the various food companies constantly invented new protein structures to tittilate the taste buds of their customers. At one point, the speaker's main competitor invents something which absolutely crushes all the oth

  • Victimless? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:47AM (#10504363)

    The focus behind this work is 'victimless' leather."

    So where do they get the human bones from? Or aren't we supposed to ask that?

    It rubbs the lotion on its skin...

  • I think we're missing the real benefit here (Score:3, Interesting)

    by El ( 94934 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @11:48AM (#10504366)
    Seamless leather clothes, grown exactly to your dimensions -- now that's something I'd pay money for! Most of my leather jackets seem to come apart at the seams after several years of continuous use and abuse... can they also genetically engineer these cells for different pigments and eliminate the dyeing done on most natural leather products?

  • Victimless cotton (Score:4, Funny)

    by foniksonik ( 573572 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @12:01PM (#10504488) Homepage Journal
    Next they should work out how to grow pure cotton fibres so they can save the senseless slaughter of millions of cotton plants every year... just so us hairless apes can stay warm!

    I'm outraged that they have chosen the ignoble cow to save, itself guilty of torturing living plants (did you know they eat them alive... then chew them and grind them up several times before sending them to four, count them four stomaches to be slowly and cruelly digested via the use of ACID!).

  • Next! (Score:1)

    by Jahf ( 21968 )
    I can get leather whenever I want it and until we all stop eating real meat the leather I buy won't be hurting any animals.

    What I want is a chairdog [technovelgy.com]!

  • Maybe you could get a small sample of Fluffy's skin. (I'm sure Fluffy wouldn't object--It's all in the name of science, right?) And grow your coat that ends up looking like your pet. I bet you could really freak out someone who gave you the pet in the first place! "Dude, I'm am SO glad you had to move to that apartment and you had to give up Fluffy. Check out my coat!"

    BTM
  • At the least, what the pictures have shown is not leather. Leather is what you have after tanning a hide (a process which usually involves chemicals or enzymes, if I recall correctly). What is shown is raw hide, untreated skin (and, in this case, bone).

    I grew up in the rural areas of the northern Rocky Mountains, and I've seen more than one disembowled deer corpse hanging from a garage ceiling--among other things that would make a vegan howl in rage (after heaving, of course). Those images still disturb me
    • Normal primary cell cultures i.e. ones that would be made from real tissue can only divide so many times before they stop. Some contend that this is due to innate limitations in normal cells - others say it just reflects the way cells are grown in culture - no matter - cancer cells and some pre-cancerous cells have the property of being "immortalized" in that they can be cultured indefinitely.

      The article says that the cells were of the immortal variety which mean that they were likely derived from tumors
  • Burns: Some men hunt for sport, Others hunt for food, The only thing I'm hunting for, Is an outfit that looks good... See my vest, see my vest, Made from real gorilla chest, Feel this sweater, there's no better, Than authentic Irish setter. See this hat, 'twas my cat, My evening wear - vampire bat, These white slippers are albino African endangered rhino. Grizzly bear underwear, Turtles' necks, I've got my share, Beret of poodle, on my noodle It shall rest, Try my red robin suit, It comes one breast or

  • zerg (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Lord Omlette ( 124579 ) on Tuesday October 12, 2004 @01:42PM (#10505700) Homepage
    Uh, wow. What's next, a chair made of human skulls?
  • I was reminded of the alien in the Independance Day movie, which is "wearing" what looks like a living outer body shell.

    If we could manage to make that concept into reality, it would be great for sending humans in hostile environments, inside living suits genetically engineered to thrive there.
  • Eeewww...

    Does it look anything like this [clockwork-harlequin.net]?
  • All the comments indicating that the cows will still get slaughtered in millions, even if we have artifical hide are very true. It might be agood idea then to follow on this concept. How would everyone feel about eating a nice juicy steak with the only difference being that it was cultured artifically rather then comming from the animal. Research for medical purposes is already advancing in context of organ regenertion/regrowing.

    Why dont we try artifcal milk as well etc. etc... except i get the feeling
  • Skin jackets?

    It puts the lotion on its skin...

  • Leather would be a big deal, but I think fur would be bigger. The presence of cheap and abundant lab-grown real fur, leather and hide could alter the clothing market as much as the discovery of synthetic fiber. Plus it would utterly erase poaching, and could save a few species.

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