Chinese Lab Uses CRISPR to Turn Fungus Into a Chicken Substitute
A short note of skepticism kicked off the original piece: some readers wondered whether the report was an AI-generated headline or a rushed human take, since the idea sounds almost too tidy — less land, lower emissions, faster protein. The tone of those objections mixes disbelief with moral unease about engineering food to compete with what some consider natural or divinely given. That reaction sets the context for the science that follows and why the story landed with a thud for some audiences.
A team of Chinese scientists used CRISPR gene-editing tools to alter a strain of fungus that they say can replace the protein normally provided by chicken and can even approximate a meatlike taste. Their findings were reported in an article titled “Dual enhancement of mycoprotein nutrition and sustainability via CRISPR-mediated metabolic engineering of Fusarium venenatum,” published in the journal Trends in Biology on November 19. The researchers present the work as both a nutritional and environmental advance.
Fusarium venenatum is already the base organism for commercial mycoprotein products, and companies have developed fermented meat substitutes from it. One producer notes the product can produce edible protein with 95-percent less carbon emissions than a comparable amount of ground beef, and the company describes the result as “delicious.” That commercial history gave the new genetic tweaks a ready-made frame for comparison.
The lab team employed CRISPR to remove two genes that thickened the fungus cell walls and made digestion harder for humans. The researchers emphasized that they did not introduce foreign DNA to accomplish this outcome. The gene deletions made the fungus easier to break down and allowed it to direct more of its nutrient intake into protein production.
The modified strain, which the team labeled FCPD, showed striking lab metrics: it used 44 percent less sugar and produced protein 88 percent faster than the unmodified Fusarium venenatum. The designers calculated that, at scale, FCPD would emit 60 percent less greenhouse gas than the original strain and would require 70 percent less land than comparable chicken farms. Those percentages are prominent in the paper and drive the claim of a sustainability edge over conventional poultry.
“There is a popular demand for better and more sustainable protein for food. We successfully made a fungus not only more nutritious but also more environmentally friendly by tweaking its genes,” said one of the paper’s authors, Xiao Liu of Jiangnan University in Wuxi, China. That exact quote anchors the team’s stated motivation and frames the work as a response to consumer and environmental pressures.
Not every lab-grown or lab-modified protein proposal passes environmental muster once you run full life-cycle models, and past analyses have questioned whether beef alternatives really reduce overall impact. Some 2024 work from university groups examined large-scale shifts toward lab-grown meat and found mixed or minimal net environmental benefits in many scenarios. That context matters when comparing any new fungal strain to established farming methods.
Chicken is generally cleaner on emissions than beef, which is why most comparisons aim at poultry for taste, efficiency, and environmental footprint. The FCPD strain, on paper, looks like one of the few engineered alternatives that could offer meaningful net benefits over chicken, provided it scales economically and consumers accept the product. Consumer acceptance remains the biggest practical obstacle for any substitute that must compete at grocery scale and on the dinner plate.
Fungus chick, I am! I am!
Grown in goo, not yoke or yam!
I don’t like your fungus chick!
I don’t like it, Sam I am!
The research frames an intriguing technological option: engineered mycoprotein that grows faster, uses fewer inputs, and may cut land use and emissions versus poultry. The next steps are rigorous safety assessments, transparent life-cycle analyses, and real-world market tests before any such product could become a significant part of the food supply.