Test-tube burgers.

• Position: Food - Genetically modified foods - Brief article

Dutch scientist Mark Post wanted to find a way to satisfy the world's increasing hunger for beef, but in an eco-friendly way. The result: lab-grown burgers, which may get a taste test as early as October. Post put cow stem (embryonic) cells in a Petri dish, allowing them to grow into strips of muscle tissue; 3,000 of those strips are needed to create a single synthetic burger. The lab-raised beef, he says, could help feed the world's exploding population, especially in places like China and India, where people are consuming more meat as living standards improve. Unlike raising...