Commercial use of a bioreactor to grow endosperm cells of wheat to create flour.

To mass produce flour in a sustainable way in any condition continuously under any climate to ensure a steady supply of flour products to all markets, even at times of global supply disruption and low crop yields.

The world today faces many problems in ensuring everyone has equal access to food. Disruptions such as war or droughts can mean not enough wheat is grown and as a result less flour is on the market meaning higher costs for less developed countries. This solution would ensure that there is always enough flour at any time of year and in any environment as the solution is not dependant on whether conditions and available water.

Create a company that uses bioreactors (an artificial growth environment) to mass produce endosperm cells. These are the cells that are broken down into flour used for baking bread. The cells will proliferate (divide) in number in the watery growth solution in the growth medium composed of different plant growth hormones and nutrients. After a sufficient number of cells had been grown, they will be tapped off, dried and grinded up to create flour. This flour will be identical to its field grown counterpart. The solution for growth could be used over and over with new nutrients added into every batch to stimulate new growth. Benefits of this solution are that this process happens 24/7 and the crop yield is constant as opposed to only one crop yield on the field. The bioreactor can be installed in virtually any environment making the process replicable in remote dry parts of Africa or even cold areas of northern Norway where no crops can grow. This would cut down on flour transport costs and decrease global dependance on only a few major wheat growing regions. Immortal cell line (by adding an immortalizing gene) needs to be established by extracting endosperm cells (the ones used to make white flour) out of the wheat grain. Endosperm cells need to be genetically engineered in a way that would allow them to become immortal (divide indefinitely and enhance growth and multiplication rate) Based on genetic engineering possibilities with this type of cell, different engineering techniques would be chosen, either plasmid transfer, bacteriophage virus or particle bombardment to transfer desired characteristics into the cell.) After establishing a genetically modified immortal cell line it would be inserted into a bioreactor containing a vitro solution for administering growth with automatic supplying of all necessary minerals, nutrients and substances for growth Cells would multiply in the bioreactor in a similar way as lab grown meat cells do. After growing the cells would be scraped off and the rest of cells would be kept growing until the next scraping takes place. - this needs to be researched on how they do it with meat cells to modify the process for plant cells. (the way it is done with meat cells is that the meat cells sort of float in the vitro solution and multiply in it. So at the end of divisions you get a mushy oily liquid, which you then separate by filtering or centrifugation to get a group of cells which you then connect for meat, but for our purposes we will dry them and grind them to be made into flour.) Cells will be dried and grinded into flour, packaged and shipped via land, air and sea to desired destinations. Advantages of such a process: No need to use a field to grow crops so fields can be used for other purposes Not dependant on weather Can be grown in dark underground or in arctic or desert environments Less people used in process Less biological waste of stalks and leaves More effective in terms of transport - cells can be grown in region of consumption Lengthy supply chains not needed as factories can be built worldwide Cells grow all year round by the same rate not only one yiely per year as with crops No need of field replacing with other crips as nutrients always supplied by bioreactor Rats, mice and other animals such as rabbits will not be killed during the collection of wheat and their habitat will not be destroyed Fields to be used for other crops or for high carbon collecting trees that can live all year round rather than crops that do not consume as much co2 as trees and a lot of co2 is produced in the farming and processing stages. Disadvantages of such a process: Electricity intensive Need of building a factory 24 hour personnel monitoring needed More significant starting initial investment - facility