Rapidly evolving technology and increasing concern about the environmental impact of meat production are signs that vat-grown meat is moving from scientific curiosity to consumer option. In vitro meat production is a specialized form of tissue engineering, a biomedical practice in which scientists try to grow animal tissues like bone, skin, kidneys and hearts. Proponents say it will ultimately be a more efficient way to make animal meat, which would reduce the carbon footprint of meat products.

“To produce the meat we eat now, 75 to 95 percent of what we feed an animal is lost because of metabolism and inedible structures like skeleton or neurological tissue,” Jason Matheny, a researcher at Johns Hopkins and co-founder of New Harvest, a nonprofit that promotes research on in vitro meat, told Wired.com. “With cultured meat, there’s no body to support; you’re only building the meat that eventually gets eaten.”

I can’t wait. Maybe my recent commitment to refrain from eating mammals won’t spell the end of my red-meat-eating days after all.

Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan

Damien suggests that there’s a better than average chance of winning a Wii today in Science Week Ireland‘s competition, and that’s all the inducement I need to blog about the best invention of 2007. The problem is, as a Politics and Philosophy student who doesn’t usually pay too much attention to matters of science and technology, I’m not aware of what useful inventions 2007 witnessed, or rather I wasn’t until I did some research on the matter (you see, Science Week does promote engagement with science!).

Anyway, I googled “inventions 2007″, had a look at a few different websites, and finally decided that ‘Slidingly Engaging Fastener’ is the best invention of 2007, even though it has probably the worst name of all this year’s inventions. Slidingly Engaging Fastener is basically a much stronger, plastic and less noisy version of Velcro. As you can see in the picture with the inventor Leonard Duffy, it’s already being put to use in removable plastic casts, and there are plans to use it for connecting artificial limbs to people. Plus it can be used for all the things that Velcro is used for, such as the straps on ski gloves and jackets, or as an alternative to shoelaces for children.

Not only does Slidingly Engaging Fastener not wear down over time, it also has the added benefit of not catching fabric in its grip, meaning that you’ll never again have to take an old, Velcro-equipped ski-jacket out of your wardrobe and find it riddled with strands of wool from an ex-girlfriend’s jumper, stirring up all sorts of bad memories in the process. What an invention!

The mantra I repeat to myself every time I’m heading out the door at home is ‘phone/wallet/pod/keys’. This serves as quick checklist for everything that I’ll usually need in the course of a day. The next gadget I want to buy is one that will do away with the need for such a list, i.e., a gadget that serves as a phone, a method of payment, an MP3 player, and my car keys. Such a device is surely not too many years away, and it would be monumentally helpful in freeing up pocket space.

Technically, this should be achievable. There’s already a phone/music player hybrid, so the other two features could just be built into this. A method of payment feature would work much like a laser of VISA card, except it would be scanned a little differently, or maybe it could transfer the relevant information itself to some receiver at the cash register (a noun which will surely sound anachronistic within a decade or so). As regards integrating a car key, I believe that this should be even easier to accomplish. I’m pretty sure that my dad’s car doesn’t have a key as such, but instead the device that typically serves as an remote control locking system doubles as the means of ignition. Obviously there’d be some issues with regard to different models of cars needing different programming, and of course the settings for each car would have to be a little different, but this could all be ironed out eventually.

So there you have it. When I’m replacing my Polo (which probably won’t happen for some time), I want to be able to operate my next car with a device with which I can also make phone calls, with which I can also listen to music, and with which I can also pay for things. Get cracking Apple…

(If the good people at Science Week want to consider this as an entry for both today’s and yesterday’s competition then they’re more than welcome to do so.)