Edible extremophiles

February 4, 2019 4:59 PM

“These extremophiles learned to be extremely efficient in using their resources,” he said. “They are very relevant at a point in time when humanity already uses tremendous amounts of resources to support the highly inefficient animal-protein model.”
posted by clew (12 comments total)

If I could form a symbiotic relationship with methane-eating bacteria, I could survive on Venture Capital meetings and press conferences.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:12 PM on February 4, 2019 [10 favorites]

Food Preservation and the Accidental History of Extremophile Research

Meanwhile, Deinococcus radiodurans, the toughest bacterium in the world according to the Guinness Book of Records, was discovered in the fifties by a scientist at the Oregon Agricultural Experiment Station who was trying to use gamma radiation to sterilise canned food. D. radiodurans (also known as “Conan the Bacterium”) was isolated from a tin of meat that spoiled after being exposed to a dose of radiation that was thought to kill all known forms of life.

posted by cichlid ceilidh at 5:22 PM on February 4, 2019 [5 favorites]

There are a lot of vegetarians on Earth, who, for centuries, if not millenia have practiced this. So these guys have to make some heavy industry, contraption to profit on the fact it is so complicated people can't just grow food? I am seeing articles about small sustainable farms as the answer. Is it that we are going to burn all the corn in cars, and demonize soy to make the monster mash seem appealing?

Asian markets are full of meat substitutes, and luscious noodles, and vegetables of all sorts.

We are going to save human populations with human chow, available in family sized bags, 25#, 50#, or 100# barrels. Available in chicken and bisquit, lamb and rice, or beef noodle, Italomato, or Mexicorncrunch styles.
posted by Oyéah at 7:42 PM on February 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

I'll take a 50-gallon drum of that last one.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:51 PM on February 4, 2019 [2 favorites]

What traditional food uses high-temperature microbes?
posted by clew at 8:08 PM on February 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

The 1990s called and wants its spirulina back.
posted by rikschell at 8:42 PM on February 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

We're looking at a future of houses made from our own shit, and diets of compressed pond scum.

And it still doesn't occur to us that there might be too many of us.

The "full Earth" needs a laxative.
posted by jamjam at 9:27 PM on February 4, 2019

“It could be some things that are more meat-like,” said Thomas Jonas, the company’s chief executive officer. “It can be savory; it can be sweet; it can be liquid; it can be dairy-like. The ones we’ve got so far are foul-smelling brown sludges, but we’ve got some really strong chemical dyes and flavourings that work well if you bleach the product first. Uh, can you delete that last part, actually?”
posted by Segundus at 12:59 AM on February 5, 2019 [2 favorites]

I'm not clear why this is different to Quorn, for which the macro scale feedstocks are starch and ammonia.
posted by ambrosen at 5:44 AM on February 5, 2019

Thy kingdom Quorn
Thy swill be born
From Earth as it is
A heavin'.
posted by Oyéah at 10:00 AM on February 5, 2019 [1 favorite]

I'm not clear why this is different to Quorn

I think the Quorn fungi operate pretty much at STP? Extreme thermophiles don't, by definition, which changes the energy `landscape' for chemical reactions. (Microbiology prof, very earnestly: ``The archaea are far more metabolically talented than we are.'' By `we' she meant eukaryotes.)
posted by clew at 11:04 AM on February 5, 2019

I actually really like Quorn, but I'm not entirely convinced it's healthier or more sustainable than soybeans. It's certainly less nutritious.
posted by aspersioncast at 12:05 PM on February 5, 2019