NAJU — Cultured meat, long limited to ground forms, is evolving into steak-style cuts.
A research team led by Professor Joo Seon-tae at Gyeongsang National University has developed a three-dimensional, whole-cut hybrid cultured meat with a fibrous grain and visible marbling, the Korea Institute of Planning and Evaluation for Technology in Food, Agriculture and Forestry (IPET) said on the 22nd. The research was funded by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and IPET through a high-value-added food technology development program.
The findings address two of the biggest drawbacks of cultured meat at once: high production costs and poor texture. Earlier cultured meat products were mostly ground forms such as hamburger patties or nuggets.
The team instead combined cultured muscle cells with plant proteins from peas, soybeans and wheat. The mixture was spun into thread-like artificial muscle fibers and bundled together to create a three-dimensional whole-cut structure with a distinct meat grain. The researchers then coated the product with a blend of vegetable oil and beef tallow to reproduce the fat distribution of sirloin and tenderloin, along with the chewing texture of real meat.
The team also developed factory-scale production equipment. The system extrudes and bundles fine muscle fibers in large volumes, much like making noodles. The process is seen as a foundation for mass-producing whole-cut cultured meat.
Cost competitiveness also stands out. The team applied a hybrid method that uses plant proteins as a scaffold and combines them with cultured cells, and introduced technology that allows the cell-culture scaffolds to be reused multiple times. The researchers expect the approach to cut production costs by 70% to 80%. If commercialized, the product is projected to sell for about 40,000 won per kilogram, which the team says is roughly half the price of top-grade Korean beef sirloin.
The team is also moving quickly on commercialization. It founded a laboratory startup, Orange Cow, in July 2024 and is now pursuing commercialization based on a completed prototype.
"Researchers at a Korean university have secured world-class cultured meat technology needed to address future food supply problems," IPET President Park Hong-jae said. "We will support this technology all the way so that it does not remain in the laboratory but reaches actual dinner tables."