Future farmer: Laura Jackisch, Fat Tissue Biologist
In this series we’re interviewing Mosa Meat’s future farmers, pioneers of cellular agriculture, about what inspires them. Today we spoke with Laura Jackisch, our Fat (Tissue) Team Lead.
Laura, tell us a little bit about yourself—where are you from?
I was born in Germany; I’m half-German half-Austrian. For the first seven years of my life I lived in Berlin. Then I moved to London for five years, and after that I lived in the Middle East.
My dad comes from a hospitality family, and he got his masters degree in culinary arts. He’s been an Executive Chef at hotels around the world—that’s why we moved around! My mom is in finance but she’s also trained in running a restaurant.They used to own a hotel together when I was very young. I remember seeing photos of my sister sitting in the kitchen on a high chair covered in blueberries....My life has been quite food-centric!
My parents encouraged me to explore science because my mother also had a passion for it and studied medicine. I took all the relevant classes in secondary school—biology, chemistry, maths—and loved them, so I went on to study biochemistry at University. When I was 20, I did an internship at a lab looking at fat...that’s when the love affair with fat began!
Speaking of fat, when did you discover cultured meat—and Mosa Meat?
Several years later, I started my PhD in the UK focusing on obesity and diabetes. I went vegan that year, and to explore replacements of cheese and meat, I went on a deep dive into alternative proteins. There’s a lot of plant-based stuff out there, but I also stumbled across cultured meat and learned about Mosa Meat in 2016.
As I was writing my thesis, I checked Mosa Meat’s website and saw they were looking to hire a postdoc in Adipogenesis (the process by which stem cells become fat cells). There were about 20 employees at Mosa Meat at that time, and I joined in April 2019 as the Team Lead for Fat.
Would you describe yourself as a scientist, or something more?
I’m no longer a pure cell biologist the way that I used to be. Our work is more multi-disciplinary.
I think about things I never would have thought of during my PhD. For example, “What do my fat cells taste like?” I think about consumer acceptance. I think about cost. I think about sustainability. It goes so far beyond the traditional discipline.
Also, we get to translate our R&D into a product or process—with a benefit for people, animals, the planet. I think that’s every scientist’s dream, to see the work they do be used in a way that’s beneficial and for the greater good.
And as a cell farmer—how does it feel to grow cells?
During the PhD I would look at my fat cells with anticipation every day to see how they were doing. I think that still translates, but now it’s at a much bigger scale.
Everyone here feels that excitement when you’re growing the cells. You feed them every day. You message each other saying “I got this many cells, we’re getting there!” Then you start to differentiate them...and turn them into fat. You see it getting closer and closer to the finish line, until it’s ready to eat.
If you sit back and think about what you’re doing—taking a few thousand cells and from that you’re going to feed people...It’s pretty mind-blowing.
How have things changed at Mosa Meat since you joined?
It’s really exciting to have been here from early on. When I joined two years ago, our team was in its infancy, with only an intern, a PhD student and myself. Since then, we have moved forward to a stage where we produce fat tissue that is food-compatible, completely animal component-free and most importantly delicious. My team has eight people in it now.
Mark [Post, our cofounder] always says it’s amazing what can happen when you throw a lot of people at a project. If you have enough brains and enough motivated people, things start to move forward very quickly.
Laura with one of her team members, Sebastiano.
What motivates and inspires you the most about working at Mosa Meat?
I’ve been vegan since the start of my PhD. Once you really open your mind to how animals are treated, it’s really hard to push that to the back of your mind and forget about it. Knowing that we kill billions of animals every year for a few minutes of satisfaction every day, I just don’t think it’s worth it.
The way that the food system currently uses animals to feed people and how it’s affecting the planet—preventing that is what motivates me every day.
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