A 17-year-old scientist is involved in creating a tomato which has the flavour of a beef burger and might thus provide a new method of combining the taste of meat with the nutritional advantages of plants. Gabriella Rothberg, who founded Impossible Vines, is altering the genes of tomato plants so that they will produce heme, a molecule containing iron that is linked to the taste of meat.
She told Miami New Times that her experiment is intended to get tomatoes to taste more like beef while at the same time providing nutritious iron. If the project is successful, it could lead to new possibilities regarding plant-based foods and nutrition, especially for communities in which meat is less accessible.
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The teenager is carrying out the project in association with Maddison Marshall, who is a PhD candidate at the University of Miami; her research involves genetic engineering, plant tissue culture and food science and looks into whether tomatoes can be developed to have a taste very different from that of an ordinary tomato.
How is the 17-year-old growing tomatoes that have a meaty flavour?
The aim of Rothberg's Impossible Vines project is to genetically engineer tomato plants so that they produce heme, a molecule which contains iron and is important for the flavour profile of meat. The Miami New Times reports that Rothberg makes use of a bacterium known as Agrobacterium in order to introduce genetic material into tomato plants. This enables the researchers to alter the plants so that they are able to produce certain compounds.
The aim is to create tomatoes that have the flavour of beef and possibly improve their nutritional content. When talking to the newspaper, Rothberg explained the idea in simple terms by saying, "You'll bite into a tomato and it'll taste like a hamburger."
The project is still in the process of being developed, and the goal mentioned should not be taken to mean that there is already a tomato on the market which has been proven to taste like a burger or to provide a certain amount of absorbable iron.
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A laboratory devoted to tomatoes
Rothberg has given viewers a look at her work via the Impossible Vines Instagram account, showing them around her laboratory and explaining how the plants are grown. In a post made on October 12, she explained the development of a plant which had started out as a tissue-cultured explant in June.
She wrote that from a small leaf on a petri dish we had been able to grow stem cells, then shoots, and finally roots. She went on to say that the plantlet was transferred into soil and then slowly acclimatised to the surrounding humidity until it had become an established plant. Rothberg has recorded the various stages of her experiment, covering both the laboratory work and the growing of the plants.
Rothberg says her tomatoes contain a gene that make them taste like hamburgers.
How tomatoes high in iron might make a difference
AN aim of Rothberg's is to create tomatoes which have sufficient absorbable iron so as to make a significant contribution to nutrition. She told Miami New Times that her project might one day be of assistance to people in parts of the world where meat is hard to get, such as those in the Global South.
It has not yet been determined what the project's nutritional impact will be. The plan is to find out if a common food like a tomato can be altered so as to give it extra nutritional value while at the same time having a different flavour.
Rothberg comes from a family where science is a prominent background. Her father, Jonathan Rothberg, was awarded the National Medal of Technology and Innovation in 2013 as a result of his work on next-generation DNA sequencing technology. Her mother is a doctor and a cancer researcher, as stated by the Miami New Times.
The outlet also stated that Gabriella has drawn up a business plan and obtained a patent for Impossible Vines with the help of AI. A patent was granted to Impossible Vines Inc. in June, with Gabriella Rothberg and Jonathan Rothberg listed as the inventors.