Oilseed protein isolates as albumin alternatives for muscle cell culture media

The development of cost-effective serum-free media is essential for the development of cell-cultured meat technologies. While some effective media have been developed for relevant cells (e.g., bovine muscle stem cells), these rely on costly recombinant albumin which is too expensive for a scalable system. In this study, we explored bulk protein isolates from rapeseed, cottonseed, and soybean as alternatives to recombinant albumin, and show that rapeseed protein isolate (RPI) is effective in replacing albumin for the serum-free culture of bovine muscle stem cells. We additionally performed proteomic characterization of the three oilseed protein isolates used in the study to compare how proteomic differences might be associated with functional differences between these proteins.