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bioRxiv · 10.1101/2022.09.02.506409

A Beefy-R culture medium: replacing albumin with rapeseed protein isolates

Stout, A. J.·Rittenberg, M. L.·Shub, M.·Saad, M. K.·Mirliani, A. B.·Kaplan, D. L.
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Abstract

The development of cost-effective serum-free media is essential for the economic viability of cultured meat. A key challenge facing this goal is high-cost recombinant albumin that is necessary in some available serum-free media formulations. As such, there is substantial interest in finding albumin alternatives which are low-cost, effective, scalable, sustainable, and suitable for food applications. Recently, a serum-free medium termed Beefy-9 was developed for bovine satellite cells (BSCs), which relied on recombinant albumin as a key component to replace fetal bovine serum. Here we alter Beefy-9 by replacing albumin with rapeseed protein isolate, a bulk-protein solution obtained from agricultural waste-streams through simple isoelectric protein precipitation. This new medium, termed Beefy-R, improves BSC growth compared with Beefy-9 while maintaining cell phenotype and myogenicity. These results offer an effective, low-cost, and sustainable alternative to albumin for serum-free culture of muscle stem cells, thereby addressing a key hurdle facing cultured meat production.

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Stout, A. J., Rittenberg, M. L., Shub, M., Saad, M. K., Mirliani, A. B., Kaplan, D. L.. 2022-09-04. A Beefy-R culture medium: replacing albumin with rapeseed protein isolates. https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.09.02.506409

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