Crisp makers warn the EU's 31-word meaty-names ban could catch roast chicken and bacon flavour names, and want snacks exempted [54].
02
A Nature study in mice and human cells links dietary cholesterol to a pathway that strips the liver of LDL receptors; the blocking drug has passed a Phase 1 safety trial but has not been tested on cholesterol in people [20].
03
Researchers grew mouse muscle cells on watermelon-rind scaffolds in a bioreactor, a proof of concept for cheaper cultivated meat [12].
04
The 2026 Borneo fires have burned an estimated 30% of a long-running orangutan study site, and the last fire's aftermath is a warning [38].
Crisp makers warn EU meaty-names ban could catch roast chicken flavours
Photo: plant based news
Plant Based News reports that plant-based brands will soon be barred from using 31 meaty words in EU markets, and that crisp makers fear their flavour names could be caught too [54]. The European Snacks Association's legal analysis finds three pieces of legislation in conflict with no clear answer on which prevails, and it wants an amendment covering savory snacks, sauces and seasonings [54]. Lay's barbecue pork rib, roast chicken and beef bourguignon, and Patatas Fritas Torres' chorizo, all use words on the proposed list [54].
“meaty names in the flavor description might be in scope.”
Olivier Devaux, director of nutrition, health, and sustainability at the European Snacks Association, speaking to Politico · [54]
“No one is confused by terms like ‘vegetarian sausage,’ as numerous surveys attest. So, in fact, there is no need to restrict such labeling.”
UC San Diego team finds dietary cholesterol switches on a pathway that destroys LDL receptors
Photo: sciencedaily
Researchers at the University of California San Diego report in Nature that chronic dietary cholesterol activates Ral proteins, which route the liver's LDL receptors to lysosomes for destruction [3]. In mice, blocking the enzyme cathepsin A with a small-molecule inhibitor made the receptors more stable and dropped circulating LDL [20]. The inhibitor passed a Phase 1 safety trial as a heart failure drug, but it has not been shown to lower cholesterol in humans [20].
“We've known for a long time that a high-cholesterol diet reduces the liver's ability to clear cholesterol from the blood, but we didn't fully understand why”
Alan Saltiel, senior author, UC San Diego School of Medicine · [20]
“Luckily, there's an experimental drug sitting on the shelf that's already been shown to be safe in humans”
Borneo fires have burned an estimated 30% of an orangutan research site
Wikimedia Commons / Bornean orangutan
Indonesia is in one of its most severe wildfire seasons in over a decade, with El Niño drought fueling fires across Borneo, and Max Planck Society reporting says an estimated 30% of the Tuanan study area has burned so far [38]. After the 2015 fires, Tuanan researchers recorded about 2.5 years of sharply lower fruit production, orangutans that traveled less and rested more, and no recorded pregnancies among females in that span [38]. Three of the oldest females disappeared by late 2017, and the researchers say they cannot establish that the fires caused it [38].
“You hear them coughing”
Maria van Noordwijk, Max Planck research fellow who helped establish Tuanan, on the 2015 haze · [38]
“At the same time, I'm afraid that the toll will be worse than last time.”
Maria van Noordwijk, Max Planck research fellow · [38]
By the numbers
Around 15%of Tuanan's forest was lost in the 2015 fires [38]
95 daysthe 2015 haze persisted at the research site [38]
Since 2003orangutans there have been monitored, which is what lets researchers trace the fires' effects [38]
FromPlants & Animals News - Biology news
04▬InnovationStory
Researchers grow muscle cells on watermelon-rind scaffolds in a lab bioreactor
Wikimedia Commons / Watermelon
Researchers turned watermelon rind into decellularized plant scaffolds and cultured mouse muscle cells on them in a fixed-bed bioreactor for seven days [12]. Swapping the toxic Triton X-100 for Tween-20 still stripped out the DNA, and the cells attached, multiplied and differentiated, with higher metabolic activity than in static culture [12]. The prototypes stayed structurally stable after cooking, and the authors describe the work as a proof of concept for future scale-up studies [12].
By the numbers
below 25 ng/mgresidual DNA left in the scaffolds after decellularization [12]
36.8 ± 5.9 kPaYoung's modulus, the stiffness measure the authors cite for suitability as a cultivated-meat scaffold [12]
FromPubMed
Worth Knowing
Food & Recipes
Cook sweet potato flautas: steamed sweet potato, pinto beans and ground walnuts rolled into corn tortillas, pan-seared and served with avocado salsa verde, from the Cook. Heal. Go Vegan! cookbook [24].
Wins & Culture
Mintel predicts consumers will move "from maximization to balance," and Worldpanel by Numerator data show UK fiber consumption fell 0.5 percent from 2025 to 2026 even as Google searches for fibermaxxing rose 170 percent [51].
Activism & Animals
A Science Advances review counted 107,356 species in use and trade worldwide, more than double the roughly 50,000 estimated before, and lead author Alice Hughes says most of that trade is legal [33].
A rummy-nose tetra swimming among virtual fish behaved as if it were responding mainly to its single most influential neighbor, which can change from moment to moment [34].
Tufts wildlife veterinarian Maureen Murray found 96% of birds of prey tested in a 2023 study were positive for anticoagulant rodenticides, and she advises sealing entry points and skipping glue traps [40].
Research & Nutrition
A proteomics study on cultivated duck biomass found device-based sample kits gave the highest proteome coverage, and its authors work for PARIMA, a company that aims to commercialize cultivated meat [14].
One Good Thing
Four new species of Oreobates frogs now have names. FIU biologist Alessandro Catenazzi and collaborators used body traits, mating calls and DNA to describe them from forest near Cordillera Azul National Park in Peru, raising the genus from 27 known species to 31 [32]. "Each species is its own world," Catenazzi said, and naming one is the first step to protecting where it lives [32].
