Scientists have engineered lettuce to make a pig protein inside its leaves, which they say could give plant-based burgers the colour and taste of meat without using animal flesh.
Researchers at the Imperial College London inserted a copy of the pig gene into lettuce and tobacco seedlings, and found that the plants not only produced the protein but grew normally, flowered and passed the trait on to the next generation, according to a new study published in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science on Thursday.
