Towards the development of cultivated fish fat as novel food and nutritional sources

Fat is an important component of alternative meat, but it is challenging to mimic sensory and texture aspects of animal fat. In addition, a better nutritional profile is sought after that would contribute to consumer’s health. We tackled with these issues by using a cellular agriculture approach of producing fat derived from fish stem cells. We established superior adipogenic cell lines from edible fish species, many of which exhibit less than 20 hour doubling times, more than 200 population doublings, and close to 100% differentiation efficiencies. Culture protocols were developed for effectively growing and differentiating the stem cell lines into mature adipocytes. We further translated these 2D protocols into the scalable 3D condition. Importantly, these fish adipocytes were successfully enriched in omega-3 fatty acids. Safety, nutritional and allergenicity profiles of cultivated fish adipocytes were investigated, and deemed safe. Commercialization efforts started by spinning off a company and working toward scaling up production and reducing cost. The resultant fish adipocytes may eventually be used to complement taste, aroma, texture, and nutrition of existing alternative protein products.