| Researchers at Wageningen University & Research and Utrecht University are exploring how we could grow tomato plants in factories. This concept could transform food production and make it more sustainable and resilient. The team published its vision in the leading journal Trends in Biotechnology. |
 Growing tomato plants in factories starts with a seed or a piece of leaf. We then need to trigger the genes that command flowering. If we find the correct triggers, the starting material could develop into a flower bud. As in nature, the flower can be pollinated; or in this case: artificially induced to initiate fruit development. But instead of drawing its energy from sunlight, the fruit will grow on a carbohydrate-rich nutrient solution.
AdvantagesGrowing tomato plants in factories might have substantial advantages, according to Lucas van der Zee, PhD candidate with the Horticulture and Product Physiology group in Wageningen University. It would mean shielding part of our food supply from climate change; and also mean far less need for land to grow food. For the first time, researchers are investigating how a flower bud develops into a mature fruit. They build upon individual steps already described in literature. And bring these together for the first time in a single theoretical framework. They work together with Niels Peeters of Utrecht University, who works on the crucial step in which the starting material develops from a cell into a flower bud. Small fruits, big questionsAlthough the researchers are optimistic about the possibilities, they stress that the concept is still at an early stage. The first fruits grown in this way remain small, and their production is far from sustainable. If ordinary sugar is used to feed the fruits, the environmental benefit is offset by the extra farmland needed to produce that sugar. One potential solution is the use of CO₂-derived acetate, the main component of vinegar. This involves reacting CO2 with water while applying an electric current. Co-author Robert Jinkerson of the University of California is studying how plants can use acetate for growth; this is an important step towards a future in which food production requires hardly any land. |
The researchers do not simply raise technical, but also social and ethical questions. ‘We believe that it is important that people have a say in how their food is produced,’ says Van der Zee. ‘For fruits are more than consumption product. How we make, eat and share food helps define who we are.’ Together with philosopher and co-author Zoë Robaey of Wageningen University & Research, who studies the ethics of biotechnology in agriculture, the team is also exploring questions around ownership, access to technology, and the role of farmers and breeders.
Says Van der Zee: ‘We want to make the knowledge we develop freely accessible, so people around the world can help shape what cultivated fruits should look and taste like.’
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