Impossible Pat

We love meat, but do we have to eat the cow?

Pat Brown is a world-renowned biochemist with a list of amazing accomplishments. He graduated from the University of Chicago with a BA, an MD and a PhD in biochemistry. His goal in life was, and still is, to make the world a better place to live for all of us. Most scientists have similar goals, but Dr Brown is setting a new standard.

His accomplishments are, in large part, attributable to hardworking teams. One team he headed discovered the basic science defining the mechanism HIV infects human cells making a cure possible. He headed another team discovering a way to monitor genes in a genome. Then they created the micro-array to analyze the genome. 

These breakthroughs empower researchers to understand how cells work and how cells are compromised by cancer and viruses like the one we are being ravaged by now.  Vaccine discoveries may be speeded along due to his work.

In another effort to move science forward he joined a group whose goal is to make science discoveries available to everyone. Prior to the creation of the Public Library of Science, it was hard for scientists to publish or access new science discoveries quickly. He and his compatriots created this open source science library accelerating the spread of new science discoveries.

For these hard-won accomplishments he was awarded the American Cancer Society’s Medal of Honor and was made a member of the National Academies of Science. 

At 60, then a tenured Stanford Professor, he could have rested on his laurels with a comfortable income. Instead he decided to take a sabbatical to refocus. He wanted, again, to make a difference. He felt he needed to help solve the world’s most dangerous problem, climate change.  He is confident he has identified the best way to make the biggest difference.

Raising animals to provide us protein is extremely wasteful. Plants do the same thing.  If we make the switch to plants for protein, we will use 75% less water, need 95% less land, and produce 87% less greenhouse gasses.

The problem is we love the taste of cooked flesh. We love the smell and taste of cooked meat because meat is rich in “HEME” indispensible to life. It is essential for hemoglobin, our blood. But HEME is in plants too. Dr. Brown set out to create plant synthesized “meat” that tastes as good as dead cow (or better) by combining many important and tasty plant-based ingredients with an emphasis on HEME. HEME, whether derived from plants or from animal flesh is tasty when cooked. It is a natural craving we have, and it is best met via plants.

He assembled a focus driven team of scientists and a businessman with an MBA. It was time to become not only a science discovery team but a company. The goal was to create the best burger ever, Burger 2.0.

Success was not easy. In the lab scientists can isolate critical elements but out in the real world, to be profitable, you must be able to scale up. In other words, you must be able to make a lot of what you want to sell at a reasonable price. It just so happens; beer brewers had a yeast the science teams could modify to brew HEME. 

None of this was easy and the team met many roadblocks. At one time they neared financial collapse.

They persevered and Burger 2.0 is now the Impossible Burger. The company is called Impossible Foods. It is valued at 3 billion dollars and has created impossible pork with plans for impossible fish, poultry, and even dairy products. 

The key to success, claims Dr Brown, is being determined, staying positive, and to not fear failure. Failures in science are inevitable as each possibility is investigated. He lauds his multi-cultural team as being the most focused and determined team on the planet. 

When you find Impossible Foods on the web the company goes into detail about what is in the impossible burger and why. They say if you eat an Impossible Burger instead of a beef burger you save as much water as you would need for a ten-minute shower. You additionally pollute much less, the equivalent of cancelling an eighteen-minute drive to the city. Their burger, they claim, needs 75 less square feet of land than a burger of ground up Bessie. 

If this is all true, there is hope for our climate. After all, if we can enjoy meat that frees up 45% of Earth’s land, then the land freed up is land we can plant trees which will suck out even more CO2 from our polluted atmosphere. 

Pat’s team is multi-cultural. They may not all be American citizens, but they are, unquestionably, Ameri-CANS on a mission to make our lives sustainable, and just as important, flavorable. 

Just a note: Summer is fresh vegetable time and local growers will offer their bounty at farmer’s markets. Be COVID aware. Wear a mask and keep your spacing to show you care.

If you want local fresh produce from a Garden Meister call Mike Johnson at 906-229-5084. Get your vitamins and minerals safe and fresh at his farm or, for an extra fee, delivered. 

Search NPR podcasts, Pat Brown, for the full interview.