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Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

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Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#21

Post by crooked-v »

jareklupinski wrote: post #3

> Another former employee confirmed that staffers at the company would make jokes comparing Upside to Theranos. that's taking it a little far... their goal is providing an ethical food source, not revolutionizing human diagnoses can't wait for meat-less meat tech to get through its paces and take the time to mature. humans took hundreds of years to figure out how to herd cattle; what's another few years to make it in…

Also, there's a significant difference between "the process works on a small scale, and would work at a large scale if we can solve the reliability/consistency issues" versus Theranos' "the process literally isn't physically possible at any scale and we've been outright lying about it the whole time".

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#22

Post by syndicatedjelly »

datavirtue wrote: post #4

Maybe it's just me, but I find myself having zero patience for introductions that set me up with a story. I just glanced over the first two paragraphs, rolled my eyes, and started reading at the third.

On September 34th, Johnny decided to get up from his chair, head outside for some fresh air after sitting in his pajamas at home “working” all day, and do some Satvic Yoga.

That’s when a key line of code triggered on an errant latest-generation DJI Mavic Pro. This drone, manufactured by a “private” Chinese company, then descended 90 feet in only 4.2 seconds, and subsequently crashed. Directly into Johnny’s ass.

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#23

Post by gffrd »

pjscott wrote: post #14
xnx wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

12x? Isn't beef approximately 2/3 protein and mushrooms 1/2 protein?

Mushrooms are about 90% water, but the non-water part is indeed roughly half protein.

Say you were going to eat 8oz of beef.

How many oz of mushrooms would one have to eat to get the same amount of protein?

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#24

Post by raylad »

I'm not sure about chicken cells but my experience with growing human cells (WI-38 fibroblasts)[1] is that they want to grow in a monolayer.

The way we grew them normally was in those roller bottles [2]: you have some tissue culture medium in the bottle (containing fetal calf serum, which is still required to grow mammalian cells AFAIK, another reason most of these companies can't do what they say) and other components. Then the bottles are put on their sides on a roller mechanism, in an incubator with a controlled CO2 concentration.

The cells want to grow in a one-cell-thick monolayer all over the inside of the bottle. What they won't do is to grow a double layer. This is because they have "contact inhibition" which is a major mechanism for preventing tumor-like growth: when cells are touching each other, they stop dividing.

So these guys are trying to grow tissue and what they seem to be doing instead is growing monolayers just like this on the inside of roller bottles, scraping them off, then putting them together again.

One thing that disturbed me was that they need to coat the bottles with porcine gelatin. In that case, a lot of those "chicken" cutlets are actually pork!

[1] WI-38 cells: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WI-38

[2] Tissue culture in roller bottles (yes, the medium is red at least for mammalian cells): https://cdn11.bigcommerce.com/s-hgsfepq18i/images/stencil/12...

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#25

Post by fbdab103 »

radar1310 wrote: post #19

Another scam, imagine that.

I only skimmed it, but nothing in the article said scam? More just that they are facing enormous problems scaling production. Both at producing macroscopic quantities of chicken (vs thin chicken sheets) and how to productionize the process so it could produce the mega tons required to be a commercial product.

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#26

Post by mattnewton »

gffrd wrote: post #23
pjscott wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mushrooms are about 90% water, but the non-water part is indeed roughly half protein.

Say you were going to eat 8oz of beef. How many oz of mushrooms would one have to eat to get the same amount of protein?

>56oz according to google which lists beef at 7g/ounce and mushrooms at 0.9/ounce

Edit: legumes are more practical, green peas give you 2g/oz and peanuts can be 7g/oz shelled according to google, (though they are different proteins than the beef). Mushrooms are good for texture and some like shitaki can give the umami taste, but they aren’t a nutritional meat substitute on their own.

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#27

Post by smegsicle »

malfist wrote: post #6
sshine wrote: post #5

Why not just grow mushrooms? Their cells are meaty, super high in protein, and they already exist / the “tech” has already been developed! There is an extremely large selection, some with additional health benefits.

2-3 percent of the population has a mushroom allergy, myself included

that's too bad, they taste great with beef

maybe better than worcestershire

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#28

Post by dmoy »

gffrd wrote: post #23
pjscott wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mushrooms are about 90% water, but the non-water part is indeed roughly half protein.

Say you were going to eat 8oz of beef. How many oz of mushrooms would one have to eat to get the same amount of protein?

Like 1-3kg of non-dried mushrooms?

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#29

Post by pjot »

Loughla wrote: post #10
sshine wrote: post #5

Why not just grow mushrooms? Their cells are meaty, super high in protein, and they already exist / the “tech” has already been developed! There is an extremely large selection, some with additional health benefits.

Meat tastes good. Mushrooms taste good, but in a different way. You can want a perfect world, but it will never exist. Like it or don't, solving meat consumption and its effects on the planet is something we'll have to do. That probably involves a meaty substitute for meat.

Does meat actually taste good though? When has anyone ordered unseasoned chicken?

Salt and spices taste good.

Re: Insiders reveal problems at Upside Foods

#30

Post by dpig_ »

pjot wrote: post #29
Loughla wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meat tastes good. Mushrooms taste good, but in a different way. You can want a perfect world, but it will never exist. Like it or don't, solving meat consumption and its effects on the planet is something we'll have to do. That probably involves a meaty substitute for meat.

Does meat actually taste good though? When has anyone ordered unseasoned chicken? Salt and spices taste good.

Red meats taste good sans spices.
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