NEWS LESSONS / Race to serve up artifcial chicken Ior $1 million prize / Intermediate

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Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2012
Race to serve up articiaI chicken for $1 miIIion prize
LeveI 2 ntermediate
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anonymous donor indistinguishabIe embryo
synthetic texture stem ceII
Key words 2
Write the key words from the articIe next to the denitions beIow.
(paragraphs 1-6)
1. the way that food feels when you are eating it _____________________________
2. f two things are _____________________________, you cannot see any difference between them.
3. someone who gives money to a project but doesn't want his / her name to be known
_____________________________
4. a cell that is taken from a person or animal that you can develop into cells of any type
_____________________________
5. made from artifcial materials or substances _____________________________
6. an animal or human before it is born, when it is beginning to develop and grow
_____________________________
7. the substance that animal and plant cells are made of _____________________________
8. the development of something so that you can sell it and make money _____________________________
9. money that a government or organization provides for a specifc purpose _____________________________
10. the process of buying and / or eating something _____________________________
11. of the usual, traditional or accepted type; not new and different _____________________________
12. mental or physical pain _____________________________
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commerciaIization consumption conventionaI
suffering tissue funding
(paragraphs 8-13)
Warmer 1
How often do you eat meat?
every day
three or four times a week
once or twice a week
once or twice a month
only on special occasions
never
Do you eat meat more or Iess often than you did ve years ago?
NEWS LESSONS / Race to serve up artifcial chicken Ior $1 million prize / Intermediate

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Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2012
Race to serve up articiaI chicken for $1 miIIion prize
LeveI 2 ntermediate
Race to serve up articiaI chicken for
a $1m prize
A fve-year challenge to make meat that tastes
like the real thing
John VidaI !
21 January, 2012
A small group of people will meet in Washington
later in 2012 for what they hope will be a lunch
to change the world. The meal should be fried
chicken and nothing else. But, although it may
look like chicken, have the texture of chicken and
even taste like chicken, it will never have lived
or breathed.
n 2007, PETA, the world's largest animal welfare
group, gave scientists until 30 June 2012 to
prove they could make artifcial meat in very
large quantities. The frst scientist to show that
artifcial chicken can be grown in quantity and be
indistinguishable from real chicken meat will be
given $1 million.
"We really do not know who will apply, said
ngrid Newkirk, president and founder of
PETA. "Five years ago thought no one would.
But don't know any more. There is a real
chance someone will claim the reward. A lot of
researchers are keeping very quiet and have
their cards close to their chest. Progress is being
made. We are very optimistic.
Leading the race to show that it is possible is
Mark Post, Head of the department of Vascular
Physiology at Maastricht University in the
Netherlands. Post has been given $300,000 by
the Dutch government and by an anonymous
donor to develop his stem-cell research. He has
said he will produce a synthetic beefburger
in 2012.
Post cannot win the PETA prize because
he is working with beef, not chicken, but he
has successfully grown pieces of meat a few
centimetres long. However, his work is slow
and he is fnding it diffcult to grow the meat any
thicker or in large quantities.
Another group of scientists, at Utrecht University
in the Netherlands, is experimenting with stem
cells from embryos. One stem cell could produce
tonnes of meat, and all the stem cells from one
cow could be enough to feed an
entire country.
"But this is very complex science and harder than
we thought. We have found we cannot yet create
cells from embryos, only from adult animals and
we can't do this very effciently. think it will take
a decade and we need research money, said
Bernard Roelen, Professor of Veterinary Science.
Coming from a different direction is US
scientist Vladimir Mironov, former director of
the NASA-funded Bioprinting Research Center
at the Medical University of South Carolina in
Charleston, but now working with a Brazilian
meat company. Mironov has taken embryonic
muscle cells from turkeys and successfully grown
muscle tissue, but only in very small quantities.
Mironov is certain tissue-engineered meat will
eventually be developed: "Of course there are
people who think this is Frankenstein food.
They see it as unnatural, but there is nothing
unnatural here. We use animal cells and grow
them. The only difference is that we don't kill any
animals. So far all the meat "made has been
nearly colourless, tasteless and lacking texture.
Scientists may have to add fat and even blood
and colourants grown in laboratories.
Professor Julie Gold, a biological physicist at
Chalmers Technical University in Gothenburg,
Sweden, said it could take years before
commercialization. "There is very little funding.
What it needs is a crazy rich person.
But animal welfare groups and food
manufacturers are very excited that we may one
day be able to grow hundreds of tonnes of meat
from stem cells. The UN's Food and Agriculture
Organization expects world consumption of meat
to double between 2000 and 2050. Artifcial meat
could be a solution to this problem.
Artifcial meat has an extra advantage: it needs
much less energy and space to grow. Analysis
by scientists from Oxford and Amsterdam last
year showed that the process could use only
1% of the land and 4% of the water used for
conventional meat.
For vegetarians, the advantage is less animal
suffering. "More than 40 billion chickens, fsh,
pigs and cows are killed every year for food in the
US alone, in horrifc ways. Artifcial meat would
prevent this suffering, said Newkirk.
Guardian News & Media 2012
First published in The Guardian, 21/01/12
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NEWS LESSONS / Race to serve up artifcial chicken Ior $1 million prize / Intermediate

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Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2012
!Race to serve up articiaI chicken for $1 miIIion prize
LeveI 2 ntermediate
Comprehension check 3
Language "
a. Match the numbers and the quantities. What do they refer to in the articIe?
b. Are these statements true (T) or faIse (F) according to the articIe?
a. Find an expression in the rst haIf of the articIe that means to not tell people what you are thinking
or planning.
b. Think of a different titIe for this articIe.
1. one million a. years
2. three hundred thousand b. animals
3. fve c. per cent
4. one d. dollars
5. forty billion e. dollars
1. An animal welfare organization has offered to pay a large amount of money to any scientist who can prove
he / she is able to produce large amounts of artifcial meat.
2. Mark Post will probably win the award.
3. Meat produced from one stem cell could feed the population of a whole country.
4. The meat that has been artifcially produced so far does not taste like chicken.
5. The total amount of meat that people eat is increasing every year.
6. Food manufacturers are not interested in the commercial production of artifcial meat.
Discussion #
Extra communication task 6
Webquest $
Do you think articiaI meat is "Frankenstein food" or a way to end the "horric" kiIIing?
Is articiaI meat the food of the future? Share your opinions.
Share your favourite vegetarian recipes (for untiI the time that articiaI meat is commerciaIIy avaiIabIe).
Enter the words PETA + artihcial chicken into a search engine. What other information can you nd about
this initiative?
Do another search for artihcial meat. Compare the resuIts of the two searches.
NEWS LESSONS / Race to serve up artifcial chicken Ior $1 million prize / Intermediate

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Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2012
!Race to serve up articiaI chicken for $1 miIIion prize

LeveI 2 ntermediate
"#$
2 Key words
1. texture
2. indistinguishable
3. anonymous donor
4. stem cell
5. synthetic
6. embryo
7. tissue
8. commercialization
9. funding
10. consumption
11. conventional
12. suffering
3 Comprehension check
a.
1. d/e
the reward offered by PETA to scientists who are able to
show that they can produce synthetic chicken that could
replace real chicken meat
2. d/e
the amount of money given by the Dutch government
and an anonymous donor to research into synthetic
meat at the University of Maastrict
3. a
the amount of time that has passed since PETA
presented its challenge to scientists
4. c
the percentage of the land needed to produce
conventional meat that would be needed to produce
artifcial meat
5. b
the number of chickens, fsh, pigs and cows killed for
food in the US every year
b.
1. T
2. F
3. F
4. T
5. T
6. F
4 Language
a. have your cards close to your chest