INFORM April 2025

10 • inform April 2025, Vol. 36 (4)

Say cheese:

Biotechnology

George Hale

and the quest for

animal-free dairy

The market for plant-based foods has grown in recent years, with people embracing diets lower in, or completely free of, animal products. Yet despite the development of convincing meatless burgers, one food has remained a hurdle: cheese. This challenge has driven the launch of several food technology companies who are looking for ways to make an animal-free cheese that is indis tinguishable from the traditional product. The key lies in producing casein, a milk protein that gives cheese many of its desirable qualities, without involving animals.

A TIME-HONORED FOOD PROCESSING METHOD Cheese has been part of human diets since the earliest days of agriculture and is one the oldest foods that can be considered processed. Making cheese allowed people to preserve a perishable food source. However, plant-based cheeses make up only about one percent of the overall market, likely because food producers have been unable to make a cheese with the right texture and taste. Nut- and soy-based cheeses often disappoint consumers because they cannot stretch and melt like traditional cheese. Concerns over animal welfare and the sustainability of agriculture has been a major motivator for companies in the food biotech space. Alpine Bio founder and CEO, Magi Richani, started the company in 2016 after adopting a plant-based diet. Her training as an engineer led her to analyze dairy agriculture from a systems perspective and concluded that cows were not an efficient system. In 2023, on an episode of the tech podcast A16Z, Richani noted that it takes tons of resources to make just one gallon of milk. She felt she could use her engineering knowledge to make a better animal-free cheese.

• To achieve palatable plant-based cheese, biotech companies altered soybean DNA to grow casein, an animal protein. • Two companies announced last year that they have scaled their production processes to be commercially viable. • But commercial scale is just the first of many challenges facing animal-free protein producers.