Most people will have heard the hype about Impossible and Beyond plant-based burgers. Some meat eaters say no thanks, preferring beef. Some vegetarians prefer less meaty options. Burgers of any type can be part of a healthy diet, but how do plant-based and animal-based options stack up? In this brief post, we’ll look at a variety of plant-based and animal-based burgers. We’ll compare nutrition, price, and other characteristics.
Delicious burgers can be plant-based or animal-based. Don’t forget all the toppings and sides!
Bring on the burgers
Here are 10 types of plant-based and animal-based burgers. Most are widely available in grocery stores, restaurants, or both.
Below is a table showing the calories, fat, sodium, carbs, and protein of 10 burger options. Each row is colored from green “best” to red “worst”. All of them have some characteristics that are better and some that are worse. Note that some of the plant-based burgers are fairly small, so I’ve included details for 2 patties to enable more accurate comparison with the bigger burgers.
I’ve included the Recommended Daily Values (RDV) for a 2,000 Calorie diet, as determined by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) so we can see how each burger fits into a healthy diet. I did not include vitamins and minerals as most people in the United States are not deficient in micronutrients. One burger with a little more or less of a given vitamin is not going to make a difference in most people’s diet.
It’s pretty clear that beef consisting of 75% lean and 25% fat is not a good choice if you are looking to avoid higher calories, fat, saturated fat, trans fat, or cholesterol. On the other hand, the Original Gardenburger is not a good choice if you want protein or if you are trying to avoid sodium. The rest are somewhere in between. Impossible and Beyond burgers are remarkably similar.
Click the image to see a larger table.
Other differences between plant-based and animal-based burgers
Below is a table showing which burgers are vegan (all plant-based), vegetarian (plant-based plus eggs or dairy), or animal-based. It also shows major allergens, GMO labels, and price at two stores in Northern Virginia. Plant-based burgers are more expensive than animal-based burgers overall.
Allergens are listed here as reported on the product label. All prices are for Northern Virginia, a relatively expensive part of the United States. Click the image to see a larger table.
Don’t forget allergens
When deciding what burger is best for a given purpose, don’t forget allergens. Most plant-based burgers contain major allergens, including soy, milk, and wheat. Some also contain other allergens, such as pea, coconut, and potato. Keep in mind that meat-based burgers aren’t automatically safe either. People often mix meat with allergen-containing foods such as breadcrumbs.
Bottom line: if you’re preparing food for others, be sure to ask about food allergies, especially if your guests might expect animal-based burgers and you are serving plant-based alternatives.
Sustainability of plant-based and animal-based burgers
The criteria above are fairly easy to consider, most are right on the label. Sustainability is more challenging, in part because animals can be raised in very different ways. Surprisingly, the beef for the 75/25 frozen patties was from Brazil, which has a different impact compared to US beef due to land use changes.
One way to look at burger sustainability is that all of these are made of legumes and grains. It’s just that the animal-based options add one major step: animals. I’ve simplified the steps in the diagrams below. No matter how sustainably raised animals are, there are still extra steps for animal-based products compared to plant-based products. In short: “Reducing red meat consumption may be a small yet significant way in which individuals can lower their carbon footprint.”
Very simplified process of how we get from plants to plant-based products.Very simplified process of how we get from plants to animal-based products.
So many choices
As for which burger is best? It depends on what is important to you. If calories or price is king, Boca All American or turkey are good choices. If you’re looking for 100% plant-based, choose one of the vegan options: Morningstar Meat Lover, Impossible, or Beyond. If you are concerned about sodium, turkey or beef is best, but be careful about adding sodium-filled mix-ins or toppings. Beef and Impossible seem to be the tastiest if you are looking for a treat.
Impossibly tasty
For me at this time, calories and protein are most important factors. I am vegetarian, meaning that my diet is mostly made up of plants, dairy, and eggs. Though I will very occasionally eat sustainably raised or harvested seafood including crabs and lobster!
I don’t eat burgers very often, but I do happily use soy crumbles such as Morningstar Grillers Crumbles. These have 18 grams of protein and just 120 calories for about 4oz. Crumbles are great on tacos, nachos, mixed into soup, nearly anything you’d use ground beef for.
I’ll try nearly any plant-based product but Impossible is particularly exciting. I studied heme (the iron containing molecule that makes Impossible taste and look meaty) for my doctoral thesis. Impossible’s scientists even cited my work in some of their supporting documentation, such as their safety evaluation of soy leghemoglobin (a type of heme). I’ve enjoyed Impossible burgers in restaurants and have really wanted to cook with this plant-based option at home.
So, when I saw Impossible burger in my local grocery store, I immediately bought a package! Time for tacos! Right away, it smelled like beef, though it honestly looked like frozen cat food. It cooked up very nicely and didn’t leave a ton of grease in the pan like beef does. The “meat” had a very beefy texture and flavor that even my omnivorous spouse enjoyed. With the high price and relatively high calorie count, Impossible won’t be a daily meal, but it will certainly return to our plates, probably as chili!
We live in interesting times. The specters of overpopulation and climate change are constantly in the headlines. The possible threat of global food shortages as a result of increased food demand and climate change-induced crop failures is hovering just over the horizon. And we keep hearing the same mantra: we can’t go on producing and consuming food the way we used to. So how can humanity get out of this fix with the minimum amount of societal upheaval and ecological disaster? If we are to fundamentally alter our food production practices, we must start with a bird’s-eye view of the basic biophysical principles of our current food production system. We may need to begin making food without photosynthesis.
Fundamentals of food
Why not begin by addressing the two most basic questions of food production and consumption – namely, what is food and why do we need to eat it? Let’s start with the answer to the second question, which is simply that food is anything that provides us with two things: (1) metabolic fuel to power our thinking, our movements and our development from a fertilized egg to an adult individual; (2) building blocks to make, repair and maintain the tissues of our bodies.
So whatever food is, it has to satisfy those two criteria. There are three categories of chemical compounds that do just that: carbohydrates, protein and fats. (We also require vitamins and trace minerals for maintaining our bodies but for simplicity’s sake we will focus on these three major macronutrients.) So all types of food are in essence some configuration of carbohydrates, protein and fats with some micronutrients thrown in for good measure.
What is food? A collection of carbohydrates, protein and fats, with assorted micronutrients.
All of these three categories of macronutrients can only be made by living organisms. Granted, some organic precursors – like amino acids, which are the building blocks of protein, have been shown to form spontaneously in nature under specific conditions. (This is probably how life started eons ago.) However, the rates of formation are way too slow to sustain contemporary organisms. As animals, our fundamental problem is that we cannot synthesize carbohydrates, proteins or fats directly from inorganic precursors that occur in the surrounding environment. To be more specific, there are three chemical elements that make up the bulk of these macronutrients – carbon (C), nitrogen (N) and sulfur (S), all of which are inaccessible to us in their inorganic forms such as carbon dioxide (CO2) and molecular nitrogen (N2) in the atmosphere as well as dissolved sulfate ions (SO42–) in soils and seawater.
What that means in practice is that another organism first has to assimilate (“fix”) these three elements by incorporating them into their own biomass as carbohydrates, protein and fats before we then can acquire those macronutrients in turn by eating that organism. Pretty much all the carbon that we ingest was originally fixed by photosynthetic organisms like algae and terrestrial plants.
Up until the early 20th century, all the nitrogen that we derived from our food (nearly all in the form of protein) was originally fixed by specialized bacteria in soils and the oceans. Even with the advent of industrial nitrogen fixation (which I will get back to at the end of this post), we still rely on plants, fungi and various microorganisms to convert inorganic nitrogen compounds like ammonia, nitrate and urea into protein. Sulfur, which we also acquire as protein, can be assimilated in its inorganic forms by most organisms with the exception of animals.
The biophysical limits of food production
Now that we have defined what food is, we can start to explore the current limits of global food production capacity based on agriculture, aquaculture etc. What should be clear at this point is that we do not suffer from a shortage of carbon for food production. Consider that in addition to all the CO2 in the atmosphere (more than 700 billion tons), there are essentially limitless reserves of carbonate-containing rocks in the Earth’s crust. What is limiting are edible forms of carbon i.e. those same carbohydrates, proteins and fats I keep mentioning.
So what ultimately limits our global food production capacity is the rate at which inorganic carbon i.e. CO2, is converted into biomass. (An additional problem is that most biomass on the planet is in the form of cellulose that make up wood, leaves and straw. Although cellulose is a carbohydrate, it is not directly accessible to us because we cannot digest it. That is why we keep livestock – they are essentially walking biocatalysts for the conversion of indigestible plant materials like grass and leaves to things we can eat and drink – meat and dairy.)
Taken together, the theoretical upper limit for current global food production practices is determined by the photosynthetic capacity of the entire planet. The total amount of CO2 that is converted into biomass on land and in the seas every year is known as net primary production (or NPP for short), which has been estimated at 105 billion tons of carbon per year. That might sound like a lot (and it is) but all of those 105 billion tons are not accessible to us for food production. At the moment, the proportion of NPP that has already been appropriated by humanity for food, fuel and fiber has been estimated at 25%. Because of the biophysical constraints of contemporary agriculture (i.e. the need for arable land, sunlight, fresh water and favorable climate conditions), it is believed that this number cannot increase much further.
There are some low-tech options out there on how to get around these constraints. One key factor to consider is that photosynthetic activity is not spread uniformly across the surface of the planet. Instead it is concentrated into patches of high rates of photosynthetic carbon fixation, such as grasslands and forests. At the same time there are huge areas where little or no carbon fixation occurs – polar regions, deserts and nutrient-poor zones of the open ocean. If photosynthetic activity can be increased in an area with low natural photosynthetic carbon fixation, this would effectively increase global NPP.
Green circular fields in the desert resulting from irrigation. Image via Wikimedia Commons.
One way to increase photosynthetic activity would be for example by irrigating arid soils for agricultural production, as is done in the Wadi As-Sirhan Basin in Saudi Arabia. The problem of course is that this requires significant amounts of fresh water, which in the case of Saudi Arabia comes from aquifers that eventually will run dry. Another option is to adopt saltwater-tolerant crops, which would enable the expansion agricultural production to coastal regions where the saline soils prohibit the cultivation of conventional crops. You could take this approach one step further and simply move your crops into the oceans by cultivating macroalgae such as kelp. But what other options are there?
The problem with photosynthesis
Since we more or less take for granted that essentially all carbon in our food comes from photosynthesis, the question is rarely asked whether photosynthesis is the optimal way to fix atmospheric CO2 for food production. Photosynthesis has one major drawback, which is its absolute dependence on light energy. Because of this limitation, conventional crop production can only occur in two dimensions.
Proponents of vertical farming will point out that artificial lighting can bypass this problem and allow for stacking of crops in three dimensions. This is true in theory but in practice you quickly run into the issues of cost and energy conversion efficiency. While sunlight falling on a field of crops is essentially “free”, artificial lighting within vertical farming systems will require electricity from an external source. If that electricity comes from solar panels, we must first consider that these panels typically have an efficiency between 10-20%. Add to that the energy conversion efficiency (also known as radiant or “wall-plug” efficiency) when electrical energy goes into an artificial light source and gets converted into light energy.
On top of that you must consider what proportion of the light coming out of the light source that can actually be harvested by the plant for photosynthesis – a spectrum of light is called photosynthetically active radiation (PAR). Granted, recent developments in light-emitting diode (LED) technology look promising with respect to improvements in both energy conversion efficiency and PAR. However, that still leaves the low efficiency of photosynthesis itself, which tends to end up somewhere in the single digits. To cut a long story short, it would be preferable to have a food production system that is not limited to light energy and thereby would not be confined to two dimensions.
There is another perhaps less obvious drawback with a photosynthesis-dependent food production system, which is that the edible biomass (carbohydrates, protein and fats) is often located within the same physical entity – the crop plant itself, as the light-harvesting apparatus. This means that after annual crops such as wheat, corn or soy have been harvested, the fields in which they were grown are suddenly fixing atmospheric CO2 at much lower rates simply because there are few or no plants left in the field to do so. Remember that the key threshold in global food production is the rate at which CO2 is converted to edible biomass.
An empty field is therefore essentially a waste of photosynthetic potential while we wait for the next batch of crops to appear. (This drawback does not apply to perennial food plants such as fruit trees, which retain their full photosynthetic potential after harvest. Of course, some fruit trees will shed their leaves during winter.) So what we would like in the end is a system that also decouples CO2 fixation from the production of edible biomass. This would allow for continuous CO2 fixation independently of the rate at which edible biomass is harvested.
Breaking the NPP barrier
So to re-cap, in order to circumvent the net primary production barrier, we must come up with a way to convert CO2 to edible biomass (carbohydrates, protein and fats) that (1) does not exclusively depend on light energy, and (2) ideally decouples carbon fixation from the generation of biomass edible biomass. As it turns out, this problem was solved more than 50 years ago during the height of the space race.
In a 1964 paper, researchers John Foster and John Litchfield described a continuous CO2-recycling life-support system intended for extended space travel, which would capture the CO2 exhaled by astronauts and convert it into food. This was made possible by an edible bacterium called Cupriavidus necator – also known under a host of older names including Ralstonia eutropha. This bacterium is capable of chemosynthesis, which is a process analogous to photosynthesis but relies on chemical energy carriers instead of light to power CO2 fixation. In the case of the C. necator bacterium, it uses the inherent energy in hydrogen gas (H2) to power the CO2 fixation process.
Hydrogen gas can be generated by electrolysis of water, which is the key to satisfying the first criterion of a non-photosynthetic food production system, as the electrical energy can be provided by any energy source – hydro, wind, geothermal and even nuclear. There might even be a point of using solar power for chemosynthetic production, since it would be possible to place solar panels in a place where conventional agriculture is not possible (like a desert) and then transmit the electrical energy through the power grid to wherever the hydrogen production and subsequent cultivation of edible bacteria takes place. This property also partially satisfies the second criterion of a non-photosynthetic food production system by decoupling one aspect of CO2 fixation (generation of energy) from production of edible biomass. The enzymatic machinery inside the C. necator cell is still required to convert CO2 into biomass. However, this is not a major problem since a C. necator cell growing on a H2/CO2 mixture will divide fairly quickly under optimal conditions – as often as once every three hours. This means that it is possible to harvest half of the C. necator bacteria every three hours indefinitely as long as the bacteria are continuously supplied with a H2/CO2 mixture.
Solein is an example of a protein produced without photosynthesis. Image used with permission from Solar Foods.
There are in fact some companies today that are trying to commercialize food and feed products derived from H2-dependent chemosynthetic bacteria like C. necator. The Bay Area startup NovoNutrients use industrial CO2 emissions to cultivate an undisclosed microorganism – most likely a H2-dependent chemosynthetic bacterium, which is then processed into a high-protein flour called Novomeal, which is then marketed as aquaculture feed. The Finnish startup Solar Foods are working on a similar process but intends to market the resulting protein product – called Solein, for human consumption rather than be used as animal feed. Solar Foods recently announced that they plan to have Solein for sale in supermarkets by 2021.
The idea of eating protein flour made from bacteria might seem like a novel idea but the concept of edible microorganisms such as bacteria, yeasts and filamentous fungi is in fact quite old. The Aztecs were known to harvest photosynthetic bacteria from Lake Texcoco before the lake was drained following the Spanish conquest (the remaining lake basin is now part of Mexico City). The same kind of photosynthetic bacteria are still harvested today from alkaline lakes in Chad by the indigenous Kanembu people (as described in the video below). In 1902 the Marmite Food Company in the UK launched its now (in)famous sandwich spread made from spent brewer’s yeast. More recently, biomass from the filamentous fungus Fusarium venenatum is used as the main ingredient in Quorn-brand meat imitation products.
Microbial biomass makes a good source of food due to its high protein and vitamin content. Unfortunately, only a small minority of edible microorganisms is capable of chemosynthetic growth like that of C. necator. Most edible microorganisms instead require organic substrates for growth – sugar being the most commonly used substrate for microbial biomass production at present. However, most microorganisms also have the ability to grow using very simple organic compounds like hydrocarbons, alcohols and organic acids.
As it happens, there are a number of hydrocarbons, alcohols and organic acids that can be synthesized directly from CO2 using different chemical and biological processes. This means that rather than edible microorganisms fixing CO2 themselves, the CO2 is fixed in a separate process to produce an organic compound that the edible microorganism can then use for growth. Such a two-step process would satisfy the two criteria for non-photosynthetic food production mentioned previously, namely (1) not being solely reliant on light energy and (2) decoupling carbon fixation from generation of edible biomass.
There are several possible options for how edible microbial biomass could be produced from organic compounds that in turn have been synthesized directly from CO2. I will describe one such example in more detail. Methanol (CH3OH) is the simplest alcohol and can be produced from CO2 by a simple hydrogenation reaction:
CO2 + 3 H2 → CH3OH + H2O
The company Carbon Recycling International runs a factory on Iceland, which produces 4,000 tons of methanol per year by hydrogenating CO2 from emissions that come from a neighboring geothermal power plant. This methanol is intended for use as a drop-in fuel but could also be used to cultivate a wide variety of edible microorganisms. Although methanol is toxic to animals, many microorganisms can grow just fine using methanol as their only source of metabolic carbon. In fact, during the 1970s and 80s, the British company Imperial Chemical Industries developed a high-protein animal feed called Pruteen, which was derived from the edible methanol-assimilating bacterium Methylophilus methylotrophus.
Ultimately Pruteen production was discontinued due to rising methanol prices and competition from cheaper soy-based feeds. Nevertheless, the Pruteen process demonstrated that it was possible to produce edible microbial biomass in significant amounts (50,000-60,000 tons per year) from a single 1,500-m3 bioreactor. I have recently estimated that if the entire US soy production capacity (about 120 million tons per year) was to be replaced with methanol factories and Pruteen-style bioreactors, it would occupy roughly one thousandth of the same land area. However, this estimate does not include energy sources to power the CO2 conversion process. So the land-sparing potential of such a process would depend heavily on the power density of the chosen energy source.
In 2018, 89.6 million (89,600,000) acres of soybeans were planted in the United States in 2018. If bioreactors were used instead, only 89.6 thousand (89,600) acres would be needed to produce the same amount of protein.
Final big thoughts
What should be clear from the examples of edible chemosynthetic bacteria as well as edible methanol-assimilating bacteria that I presented above is that producing edible microbial biomass from CO2 in a manner that does not require photosynthesis carries with it some pretty significant implications. Microorganisms are typically cultivated in large (10-1000 m3) bioreactors where internal growth conditions (temperature, rate of mixing, supply of air and nutrients etc) are controlled independently of external conditions. This means that edible biomass – food, can be produced anywhere the planet independently of local climate conditions or access to arable land. Suddenly deserts, tundra, underground caves or even the open ocean can become hubs for high-capacity food production.
If global food production capacity is no longer constrained by NPP, the new limits for just how much food humanity can produce per unit time now comes down to energy and money. What will this mean for Earth’s carrying capacity? Will the human population continue to grow if food production is no longer constrained by photosynthesis (and prove Paul Ehrlich wrongagain)? If my back-of-the-envelope calculation is correct, will the higher production density of edible microbial biomass enable us to restore a significant proportion of agricultural land to its natural state thereby protecting biodiversity – and perhaps even managing to sequester a big chunk of atmospheric CO2 in the process? It all remains to be seen.
In closing, it might be instructive to compare our current situation with the scarcity of nitrogen fertilizers (manure, nitrate-containing minerals) that faced global agriculture at the end of the 19th century. At the time it seemed as if the global food production system had reached a seemingly insurmountable boundary. Then came the invention of industrial nitrogen fixation by German scientists Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch in the beginning of the 20th century and suddenly humanity was no longer dependent on biological nitrogen fixation. As a result the human population could continue to grow from less than two billion in the year 1900 to 7.7 billion today (and counting). In fact it has been estimated that half of the nitrogen in our bodies now comes from the Haber-Bosch process rather than biological nitrogen fixation.
If humanity can become independent of biological carbon fixation as we did with nitrogen, recent history would suggest that this in itself will not promote stabilization of the global population. Instead the global population is expected to plateau and eventually shrink thanks to falling fertility rates as a consequence of increasing living standards, which allow parents across the globe to choose to have fewer children. So ultimately the challenge of this century (and perhaps the next one as well) will be to feed humanity in a sustainable fashion as it attempts to clear this demographic hurdle. And if you ask me, edible microbes produced independently of photosynthesis would seem like the way to go.
Written by Guest Expert
Tomas (“Tom”) Linder is a microbiologist and molecular geneticist who studies metabolism in microorganisms and has a particular fondness for yeasts. He is based at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in Uppsala, Sweden. Follow Tom on Facebook at Yeast Genomix.
For Valentine’s Day in 2019, A Fresh Look did something unusual. They launched the first GMO chocolate campaign, called Ethos Chocolate, and ran out of their stock in less than a day! There was plenty of excitement as free chocolates started to arrive, but not everyone got to try one. Now you can try them with me! I saved my box of Ethos Chocolate, and made an unboxing video. I tasted each one and talked about the stories that were told in chocolate form. My goal is to answer the question – is this GMO chocolate campaign Bitter, or Sweet?
Unpacking Ethos Chocolate stories
Each chocolate tells a different story about crop biotechnology and bioengineered foods. Papaya tells the story of survival, while a non-browning apple touches on trend-setting. An orange-flavored chocolate represents heroism, and dark chocolate carries the theme of optimism. Ethos chocolate has one more story to tell – did you find a fifth one in your box?
I also talk about who is behind the Ethos chocolates, A Fresh Look, and critically analyze one response from a prominent critic of biotechnology. Is something missing from this chocolate campaign that needed to be right up front, or is it just a misunderstanding?
Finally, Ethos chocolates communicated something fresh about climate change that came from an unexpected source. Did you notice it? Because I certainly did – and I’m excited to tell you about it. Watch the video, and tell me what you think about Ethos chocolates!
Another chance to Feed your Ethos
If you didn’t get to try Ethos chocolates, now you have a chance to. They have re-launched their chocolate campaign, but this time you have to make a donation to their organization to get one. Getting free chocolates was pretty sweet, but if you’ve grown accustomed to chocolatey gifts you might find the donation level a little bitter-tasting. Why do they have to tug at our heart-strings like this?!
If you got a box of Ethos chocolates, what did you think of them? Were they just what you asked for, or could they be improved? Telling stories about biotechnology with food is a great way to reach the public about the impact of this technology, and teach about the underlying science. What stories do you think they should tell if they made new chocolates with different flavors?
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently removed the final barriers for raising and selling AquaBounty’s GMO salmon in the US. These genetically engineered salmon grow faster and use less resources, while providing a healthy food that is indistinguishable from conventional salmon.
Now, Know Ideas Media has added to the conversation with the video below. Nick Saik encourages viewers to “do something real for science today” by using Richard’s template to contact your grocery store and ask for fast-growing genetically engineered salmon.
Biology Fortified runs on a content management system called WordPress. We operated a self-hosted WordPress for a decade, then moved to a WordPress.com Business Plan. While no system is perfect, we like this content management system for many reasons.
To help our own guest authors and other new science communicators get started, here is our set of mini-tutorials. These tutorials assume you are using WordPress.com, though most of the steps will also work for self-hosted WordPress.
We hope you find these WordPress tutorials helpful. If you’re looking for a place to write, consider the Biofortified Blog. We can provide guidance and editing to help you grow as an author. Group blogs have many advantages over striking out on your own – the main one being that you can spend your precious time writing instead of managing a website. Write with us!
On the top left-hand side, select My Sites, then choose the site you want to edit. You may need to click on Switch Site if one is already selected.
Then you can proceed with adding or changing content.
Create a Page or Post
Pages and Posts are the two primary content types on a WordPress site. Think of a Page as a more permanent part of the website. A Post is also permanent in that it will remain until deleted, but it will be pushed down by more recent posts over time.
For example, on our homepage at Biofortified.org, you can see six recent posts. Older posts do not appear on our homepage, but can be found on our posts page or by searching on our site.
On the left-hand side at WordPress.com, look for either Site Pages or Blog Posts and click the corresponding Add New button.
Now simply type, delete, or move text however you wish! You may notice that the text is organized in little containers. Those containers are called blocks. WordPress introduced those as part of their Gutenberg editor in late 2018. WordPress provides support on how to use the editor. You can also learn more about block types at Go Gutenberg.
Edit a Page or Post
On the left-hand side at WordPress.com, click on Site Pages and the list of all of your pages will appear. Or, click on Blog Posts and the list of all your posts will appear.
If you have many pages or posts, you can use the magnifying glass above the list of pages to search, or you can simply click on the title of the Page or Post you wish to edit.
Now simply type, delete, or move text however you wish! (as described above)
Add an Image to a Page or Post
Images (photos, charts, screenshots, infographics, etc.) are incredibly important for illustrating your content and visually breaking up text. Be sure that you have permission if you wish to use someone else’s work. See our post on Copyright and Fair Use for more information.
Infographics in particular are a great way to display complex information. What is an infographic? Learn all about them from Venngage. You can use an infographic website (such as Venngage, Canva, or Spark) or you can simply use PowerPoint or Google Docs.
In a Page or Post, hover your mouse cursor over a block. You’ll notice a plus sign appear at the top of the block. Click the plus sign, and a box with options will appear (see screenshot below). Select the Image block type, or search for image in the “Search for a block” search bar.
The image block gives you three options: upload a new image, select an existing image from the Media Library, or insert an image from another website.
To upload a new image, simply click the Upload button and follow the instructions.
To select a file from the library, click the Media Library button. You can use the search box in the library if you know the title, caption, or other information associated with the file.
Inserting an image from another website is typically not a good idea – if the other website owner removes the photo then the image will no longer appear on your website.
Once you have uploaded or selected an image, add the caption and alt text.
A caption typically describes the image or how the image connects to your text. The caption should also include your rights to share the image, such as indicating you took the image, that you have permission from the owner to share it, or includes the Creative Commons license if applicable.
Alt text helps search engines find your images, and is an important part of search engine optimization. Alt text is also important for people using screen readers: it tells them what the image is showing. Therefore, include your keyword and descriptive text.
Screenshot of WordPress block options by Anastasia Bodnar.
Screenshot of WordPress image block options by Anastasia Bodnar.
Add Anchors
An anchor is a way to link to a part of a page or post. The Gutenberg editor in WordPress makes it very easy to create something like the Table of Contents above. It’s also convenient when you want to send someone a link to a specific part of a post or page.
Click on a heading within your page or post. The menu to the left hand side will change to show heading block options.
Click on Advanced in the menu to the left.
Add a word in the HTML Anchor field that describes the section you want to link to.
Select the word or words you want to hyperlink with the anchor, and click on the link button for the paragraph section.
Instead of pasting a link, type the pound symbol #, then the word you indicated for the Anchor. For example, I would link to this Add Anchors section by typing #anchors.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Consider what your keyword or keyphrase will be for the post, and remember to include it in the title, in some of your headings, and in multiple places throughout the post. Yoast, a WordPress plugin, has great information about keywords to get you started.
Even if you’re not using an SEO plugin like Yoast, including a keyword or keyphrase throughout a post or page will help search engines to find your work. Want to learn more? The Beginner’s Guide to SEO from Mozilla is a great place to start.
Once you are done writing your post, be sure to add one or two sentences that describe your post or page in the WordPress Excerpt field. You’ll find it in the right hand navigation bar, under the Document tab. The excerpt should include your keyword or keyphrase, and can also be used as the meta description for the post or page; Yoast calls this the snippet and it will appear in search results. You can also use the excerpt as your first paragraph to help readers know what your post is about before they dive in.
Collaborate with Google Docs
Google Docs makes it particularly easy to write and edit content collaboratively. We usually can’t be in the same room when we collaborate, but with Google Docs we may as well be. Even if you’re writing solo, it can still be helpful to write in Google Docs so you have a record of your work outside of WordPress.
High five! Collaboration is an important part of this WordPress tutorial.
Compose your Text
Simply type your text into a Google Doc. WordPress will format your text to your theme font after you import. Simple formatting like bold, italics, numbered or bulleted lists, and hyperlinks will import as expected. Do not add extra breaks between paragraphs. Instead, select all text in the document, click on Format, then “Add space after paragraph.”
Do not add images in Google Docs as they do not paste into WordPress. Instead, add images directly to WordPress. You can note your captions at the bottom of the Google Doc for easy pasting into WordPress. Be sure to keep track of the sources of your images. You can also note your SEO keyword at the bottom of the Google doc to keep track.
Add Headings
Use Heading 1 to indicate the title. Do not use Heading 1 in the post or page content. Use Heading 2 to mark primary headings, and Heading 3 to indicate any secondary headings.
Keep it Simple
Even if you are writing technical content, shorter sentences, active voice, and transition words can help your readers. Further, search engines today “read” your text effectively the same way a human would. Use a readability tool to make sure that your text isn’t too complex. Once you import into WordPress, the free Yoast plugin can make some readability recommendations for you.
Collaborate
Once your draft is ready, click on the Share button in the top right-hand side of the Google Docs window. Type in the email addresses of the collaborators or editors you wish to share the document with. They will receive an email that they can now collaborate on your document. Collaborators can make comments, add suggestions, and edit the text directly.
Add Content to WordPress
Once everyone is satisfied with the document, the next step is to copy and paste the text into a WordPress post or page. The Gutenberg editor usually adds headings as heading blocks and adds each paragraph as its own paragraph block, but be sure to read through your text before publishing to make sure the content pasted as you expected. You’ll then need to add images, anchors, fill in SEO details, and set up social media sharing for the post before you are ready to publish.
Post by Email
If you have simple posts without much formatting, one very easy way to add a new post is to email it to your WordPress site! Learn more about Post by Email from WordPress.
First, you’ll need to turn on the Post by Email option. Login to WordPress, then scroll to the bottom of the left hand dashboard and select Settings. Click on Writing at the top of the page, then scroll down to Publishing Tools and turn on the “Publish posts by sending an email” option. WordPress will generate a special email address you can use to create new posts via an email.
Once you have your special email address, all you have to do is compose an email and send! You can use basic formatting like bold and italics, and basic HTML such as to designate headings. Shortcodes can add additional information such as setting the category of the post.
Be careful – any content you send to your special email address will post to your website automatically. A good option is to add the shortcode [status draft] at the beginning of your email to tell WordPress not to publish. Instead, your content will be saved as a draft post and you will need to login to WordPress to finalize the post and publish.
Note: Specific tools and websites are mentioned to assist the reader and do not necessarily indicate an endorsement.
Giving scientific presentations that aren’t dry and boring, and that people outside your field can understand is a learned skill. Not everyone can meet the challenge. This article collects some tips and links to help you give scientific presentations and other types of presentations like a boss.
An article in Nature, Top tips for giving an engaging talk, provides advice from three researchers that presented at TED events. It’s full of useful information for science communicators. For example:
Immunologist Faith Osier says: “You have to offer enough detail without getting too much into the nitty-gritty.”
Physicist Shohini Ghose reminds us: “Being engaged with the public doesn’t come for free in terms of time. One fewer TED talk would allow me to publish extra research or to go to other conferences. I don’t think that it’s for everybody. It has to match your career goals.”
Climate scientist Gavin Schmidt suggests that we should choose a main point, and each “slide should push that point further rather than go off on an ancillary detail.” This helps to reduce clutter. He also says recording a great talk is worth the investment: “Being able to point people who have contacted me with questions to the TED talk also saves me an enormous amount of time.”
Looking for more recommendations on scientific presentations? Check out these links for more details! Not that everyone has different advice and some give advice that conflicts with what others recommend. Take what works for you and don’t feel pressured to follow all of the “rules”.
Speak your science: How to give a better conference talk is a little long but one of the best articles I’ve seen on this topic. The author recommends considering the who, what, how, and why of your presentation (I’ve given presentations myself on a similar strategy for scicomm).
Scientific presentations: A cheat sheet presents concrete ideas on how to develop a successful presentation. For example, do you use an outline slide in your presentations? Coming back to your outline can help the audience see where you’re going in your talk, but be careful not to have a useless outline with non-descriptive words like “Introduction” and “Conclusion”.
10 Keys to an Engaging Scientific Presentation shares some little discussed details. For example, don’t use full sentences on your slides. Use enough words on the slide to help the audience get your point, but most of the presentation should be spoken.
If you are looking for a really deep dive on the topic, consider How To Give a Talk. Each page has great advice, organized into the following topics:
These are just a few of the hundreds if not thousands of resources out there. What resources or guidelines about scientific presentations have you found helpful?
Today is the 105th anniversary of Norm Borlaug’s birth. Born on a small farm in Iowa, Norm went on to study plant pathology. He lived a life of service, becoming of humanity’s greatest people. He won a Nobel Prize in 1970 for his efforts to improve wheat and rice, reducing the amount of land needed.
Norman Borlaug with spikes of wheat.Photo credit: CIMMYT.
On his 100th birthday, Biology Fortified and CIMMYT collaborated with artist Melody Sheep to produce this tribute to Norm. Enjoy!
Learn about Norm in this video from the World Food Prize.
Read more about Norm in these Biology Fortified posts:
As many people are getting ready to color their Easter eggs, now is an excellent time to discuss eggs – specifically their sustainability and animal welfare concerns. Eggs are a low-cost source of protein and other nutrients. They are an important and well-loved part of many people’s diets. Eggs are also more sustainable than most other animal-sourced foods. But some practices in egg production are concerning when it comes to animal welfare. A philanthropic group now aims to remedy one area of concern. (Content warning: This article discusses culling of male chicks.)
Colorful Easter eggs are just one of many ways that eggs are an important part of cultures across the globe. My Babcia (grandmother) used foods like beets, onion skins, and cabbage to color Easter eggs in beautiful muted shades.
Calling for improvements in chick welfare
The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR) has a new initiative called the the Egg-Tech Prize. This project aims to find solutions to one major welfare issue – unneeded male chicks. FFAR is offering up to $400,000 per project, with up to 5 projects selected. You have a little time to consider ideas – applications are due on May 15, 2019.
Why does this matter? Obviously, male chicks are not useful for laying eggs. But male chicks from an egg-laying breed can’t be raised for meat due to low meat quality and slower growth than chickens that are specifically bred for meat.
The current industry standard involves euthanizing male chicks by grinding, suffocating, or other means. Such work can take a psychological toll on those who carry out the euthanasia. Even if you raise backyard chickens, your chicks likely come from a facility that euthanizes male chicks. Trade group United Egg Producers pledged to stop these practices, and instead determine the sex of eggs before they hatch. The problem is, there still isn’t a good method to do that.
Even if you aren’t concerned about the welfare of chicks, the distress or pain they may experience as they are euthanized, or the ethical issue of creating a life just to immediately kill it, there’s an argument to be made for making a sustainable product even more sustainable. Culled male chicks end up as chicken by-product meal in pet food, or as fertilizer. They don’t go entirely to waste, but they could be put to better use. For example, male eggs could be diverted to vaccine production.
Note that culling of male chicks isn’t the only welfare concern associated with egg production. Other concerns include keeping layers in cages, but cage-free eggs can lead to other problems, and have a higher cost.
Incredible eggs
As shown in the below Protein Scorecard by the World Resources Institute, eggs are inexpensive (2.5 to 4 cents per gram of protein) and have relatively low impact on the environment. Globally, eggs take less water to produce than roots and tubers, dairy, poultry, farmed fish, pork, or beef. Egg substitutes are getting better all the time, but these highly-processed foods have their own disadvantages.
As FFAR points out, “for the 6 billion laying hens hatched each year worldwide, a similar number of male chicks are produced that never make it to market.” Finding ways to use (or even prevent) unneeded male chicks could have quite an impact, making eggs even less resource intensive.
In addition to being high-protein and sustainable, eggs are also delicious and versatile in cooking. These factors make eggs an incredibly important source of protein, globally. Many, many countries around the world feature eggs in traditional dishes. Groups like Heifer International advocate eggs as an important way to provide nutrition to children and help pull families out of poverty.
As we approach Easter, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention my favorite, Polish Easter Soup, also known as bread soup or white barszcz. Its tangy sour taste can be provided by vinegar or by fermented flour. Easter soup is a delicious way to enjoy Easter eggs! For many years, I have made a solid vegetarian Easter soup, though no one sells a decent vegetarian kielbasa!
Aside from holidays, my family relies on eggs as a protein source that we all enjoy. I’d feel a little better about our frequent egg dinners if culling male chicks was no longer necessary.
Alternatives to culling male chicks
How can this problem of unneeded male chicks be solved? Some have proposed Dual-purpose chickens as alternative to culling. It’s an attractive idea, but such dual-purpose chickens are not as efficient as single-purpose chickens. They are slower to grow, and lay fewer eggs, decreasing the sustainability of both egg and chicken meat production.
Various alternative culling methods have been proposed, but none are ideal. For example, 100% carbon dioxide produces a relatively quick death, but chicks are still in distress. It’s not much of an improvement, and the destined-to-die male eggs still take up space in incubators.
Screening the eggs before hatching would be better, though can be expensive, up to 5 cents per egg. Light can be used to determine whether an egg is fertilized. Light may also be a way to determine if an embryo is male or female. Researchers have found that male chick embryos are more opaque than female chick embryos.
As a geneticist, my first thought after reading about the Egg-Tech Prizewas – surely there’s a way to solve this with genetics-related methods. Biotech doesn’t solve every problem, but it’s a really useful tool!
A quick aside – chicken sex is determined by chromosomes, just as in mammals. However, while mammals are XX female and XY male, chickens and other birds are ZW female and WW male. Of course, this is a major simplification of sex, particularly when we are talking about humans. View an infographic with just some of the complexity at Beyond XX and XY: The Extraordinary Complexity of Sex Determination.
The researchers put the gene for red fluorescence on the W chromosome provided by the mother chicken. Males would get that genetically engineered W plus a regular W from their father. Female chickens would get a Z from their mother and a regular W from their father. The resulting female eggs would not have the fluorescence gene.
While this solution is interesting, I am not as optimistic as the researchers that such chickens would escape regulation. Any egg production companies wanting to use this technology (or any technology that involves DNA or biomarkers) would have to install new screening systems, a significant barrier to adoption. And, you still have a ton of male eggs that need to be used quickly before they develop into chicks or spoil.
Who needs males, anyway?
Parthenogenesis is the development of an embryo from an unfertilized egg. While rare in birds, there are examples of virgin chickens and turkeys laying eggs that develop into chicks. Perhaps an egg laying chicken breed could be developed that would lay parthenogeneic female eggs when given some sort of inducer, but otherwise would lay unfertilized eggs. There would both be no unwanted male eggs and no need for males at all!
Of course, this is much easier said than done. Plants are more cooperative when it comes to apomixis (parthenogenesis in plants). However, there are examples of parthenogenic vertebrates. For example, the whiptail lizard is a polyploid obligate parthenogen that has all female offspring.
One point in favor of this idea is that “genomic imprinting is believed to be absent in birds“. In other words, the epigenetic programming that happens in mammal embryos isn’t an issue for chickens. Another point in favor of this idea is that inducible parthenogenesis has been in development for stem cell research, so compounds are being identified that could induce parthenogenesis, such as valproic acid. Ideally, an inducer could be applied in feed or along with vaccines to reduce need for additional handling of the birds.
I don’t plan to apply for the Egg-Tech Prize, so feel please free to research and pursue this idea 😉 I’d just be happy to find eggs that don’t require culling male chicks. I’ll hard boil the eggs, dye them with onion skins for Easter, and then make vegetarian Polish Easter soup!
Does this mean that we can look forward to seeing this salmon in our local supermarkets? Sadly no, at least not all of them.
“Size comparison of an AquAdvantage® Salmon (background) vs. a non-transgenic Atlantic salmon sibling (foreground) of the same age (~12 months). Both fish reach the same size at maturity, however, the smaller non-transgenic salmon will take twice as long to grow to the same mature size. The AquAdvantage Salmon uses 25% less feed than a non-transgenic Atlantic salmon to reach market weight.” Image via AquaBounty, used with permission.
Misinformation spreads to the supermarket
Anti-GMO misinformation was turned up to 11 a few years ago, with initiatives and referendums in many US states to restrict farming or sale of GMOs. People even participated in anti-GMO marches. If you don’t recall, no worries. Unprompted GMO issues are not on most folks’ radar.
I mention these actions because it was well after that point when some supermarket chains made the bold decision to jump on the bandwagon of a waning movement with somewhat tepid statements. Trader Joe’s, Costco, Whole Foods, Kroger, Target, and several other U.S. food retailers indicated that they had no plans to carry GE Salmon. Walmart was even later to the party, according to an e-mail from an activist group.
Now, with the salmon actually able to go into production, it might be a good time to write, e-mail, or message these companies and ask them to include it in their plans. It also couldn’t hurt to notify your local grocer that you’d like them to carry this fish as well. To spark ideas, I’ll share the template I’m using in drafting my own letters. Feel free to use all, parts, or none of it, if you decide to write to some of these grocers.
Suggested letter to supermarkets
Dear ____, Current CEO, VP of Marketing, or both. (May as well aim high 😉)
The FDA has just paved the way for Aquabounty to produce and sell their fast growing Atlantic Salmon in the US. I’m writing to let you know that I would like you to carry this salmon at your stores as soon as supplies become available. The salmon is grown in recirculating inland tanks which is the most ecologically friendly and sustainable way to farm fish. The tanks have the added bonus of keeping the fish totally contained within the facility. This not only relieves pressure on wild Atlantic Salmon but is a boon to the environment. I’ve heard reports that the fish is quite tasty, and I’d love to try it myself. As a good corporate citizen, it makes sense for you to carry this fish for your customers that are concerned about the environment.
It can also help your bottom-line. You may have lingering concerns about the fish being genetically engineered because of the vast amount of misinformation that was constantly being spread years ago. When unprompted, most people are not concerned about GMOs, and it has been years since anybody marched about biotech, unless you count positive representations in the March for Science. Anti-GMO sentiment has waned, becoming a fringe issue, though they may seem to be loud from time to time. The pendulum is swinging in the other direction.
Stonyfield was soundly trounced for spreading false information on GMOs, as have other companies. This is your chance to be on top of a trend that has facts, not fear, on its side. Carrying environmentally-friendly products like AquaBounty’s salmon and items that reduce food waste like non-browning Arctic Apples and Innate Potatoes will show your commitment to sustainability. These foods are just the beginning of genetically engineered or gene edited products that are good for the environment and the consumer.
Richard Green is a microbiologist who spent his career in
biopharmaceuticals. He wore many hats moving between various departments such
as Process Development, Clinical and Commercial manufacturing. These days he
pursues his love for science via his Eclectic Science Facebook
page and the occasional blog on Medium.
In my writing at Biofortified, I often find myself debunking myths about GMOs and reviewing poor quality papers. But over the years, there has been a trend to use weak data to support genetic engineering, too. Some questionable claims are made by the crop developers themselves.
Two claims in particular stand out: 1) decreasing the amount of acrylamide when frying the Innate potato or White Russet meaningfully reduces cancer risk and 2) increasing the amount of antioxidants in crops is healthier, such as in the pink pineapple or purple tomato (links go to critical reviews).
Benefits supported by weak data
There’s little evidence to support the idea that the acrylamide that is created when potatoes are fried is harmful. Acrylamide in large amounts is known to be harmful. However, one can easily argue that the fat/calories that you’d have to eat in order to be harmed by the tiny amounts of acrylamide in the potatoes will kill you first.
Additionally, there’s little evidence to support the idea that increasing antioxidants in your diet is healthier. Undoubtedly, there are benefits to increasing the amount of fruits and vegetables that we eat, or to increasing the diversity in your diet. However, there’s not much evidence to support the idea that eating fruits and vegetables that are more “colorful” and therefore richer in antioxidants is better.
Despite the weak data, I see GMO supporters unnecessarily using the argument that these GMOs have health benefits time and time again.
Origins of weak claims
My perspective is that these crops were developed at a time when the science suggested that the traits would be helpful. Think about the antioxidant craze that existed 5-10 years ago. Now, science has advanced and the body of evidence suggests that increased antioxidants don’t necessarily prevent disease. 5-10 years ago, we also thought that acrylamide in potatoes might be harmful. But today? Not so much.
For a time, there was fear of acrylamide in fried foods, particularly since it falls under California’s prop 65. Any restaurant that fries potatoes in California must carry a sign stating that there are chemicals on site that are known to cause cancer or toxicity. As such, some food vendors may have been interested in White Russet potatoes as a means to remove the sign from their premises. But today, these signs are so ubiquitous that they are ignored by nearly everyone.
Additionally, there are so many chemicals that now fall under prop 65, that even if acrylamide is removed from french fries, there will surely be something else on the site that will require the warning, like coffee. Many people who decry prop 65 will correctly highlight how the label is meaningless because it warns against hazards and is not based on risk. Yet, in the same breath, they will say how the White Russet can help decrease levels of acrylamide and prevent cancer.
Showcase real benefits, not weak ones
If a company wants to make orange brussel sprouts or black watermelons, they have the right to do so. Once the crop goes through the regulatory process, the developer can grow it and try to sell it. Some GMO crops will have environmental benefits, health benefits, or benefits to farmers. But not all of them have to.
If a crop is more sustainable or healthier, then the importance of the trait should be stressed. The White Russet, for example, will have a non-browning trait in addition to the reduced-acrylamide trait. There’s good reason to purchase the potatoes to help decrease food waste. But if a GM crop doesn’t have a beneficial trait, if the trait introduced is purely cosmetic, that’s OK too.
These crops are as safe than as their non-GMO counterparts. They make our food supply more diverse and more interesting.
Sometimes a pink pineapple is just a pink pineapple. And who knows? Maybe kids will eat more pineapples because they’ll get a kick out of it. Or maybe some fancy chef will win the final challenge in Chopped because they’ll make pink pineapple upside-down cake. You have to assume that whatever company is making the pink pineapple has done sufficient market analysis to know that there’s a market for these traits.
To those of us who take the time to correct misinformation on GMOs: using weak data to support these crops is not only unnecessary, but also a tactic used by those who claim GMOs cause harm.
Biofortified 