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2025 Annual Meeting Report: Addressing Safety of New Technologies in Food

By Jossie Garthoff posted 04-24-2025 01:54 PM

  
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A wide range of consumer trends fuel the need for innovation in the food industry. These trends include the desire for natural food ingredients, more sustainable nonanimal protein alternatives to meat and dairy products, and the production of meat without the slaughter of animals. New technological opportunities can fulfill those needs, but they also bring potential challenges regarding consumer safety as robust safety approaches are not yet in place for all of those and need to be developed as science evolves. During the 2025 Symposium Session “Toxicological and Regulatory Considerations for Emerging Technologies and Hot Topics in Food,” the speakers in this session each introduced examples of those new technologies and the specific safety considerations to be addressed to ensure regulatory compliance and consumer safety unique for each new technology.  

  • Precision Fermentation (PF): Uses modified microbes under fermentation conditions to create ingredients ranging from colors and flavors to nutrients such as vitamins, amino acids, or human milk oligosaccharides for infant formula. The safety assessment considers the safety of the host organism, introduced genes in the microorganism, fermentation ingredients, and the final product (A. Leman). 

  • Alternative Proteins: PF can be leveraged to produce new proteins. Safety assessment extends beyond those elements for PF itself and evaluates the potential for toxicity and allergenicity of novel proteins using in silico bioinformatics assessment tools and in vitro toxicological approaches (S. Tafazoli). 

  • Biotics (Probiotics, Prebiotics, Synbiotics, and Postbiotics): Probiotics and postbiotics are microbially derived and can include live organisms (probiotics) and organisms killed by heat or other processes (postbiotics). Prebiotics are substrates, such as fibers, that are utilized by resident microbes. Biotics must be evaluated to ensure the safety of the organism and any of its contents from proteins to secondary metabolites or antimicrobial substances (M.E. Sanders). 

  • Cell-Based Meat: This approach relies on culturing cells from animals at scale. Currently, there is no systematic approach for creating a comprehensive food safety plan (FSP) that addresses the unique risks associated with cultivated meat. These risks that should be addressed include: 

    • Genetic drift during cell passaging and the nature of immortalized cells, potentially leading to toxicity and allergenicity of novel proteins  

    • Allergenicity of plant-based scaffolds and media components 

    • Chemical hazards that arise from the use of cryoprotectants and antibiotics during the early stages of cell culture and cell banking and their residues in the final products  

    • Microbial safety, with appropriate preventive control measures to avoid introduction of pathogenic bacteria and viruses at various stages of production 

    • Cell cross-contamination with other cell lines to prevent allergenicity risks (R. Ovissisipour) 

Applying those new technologies, such as PF, to derive ingredients for products for vulnerable populations, such as infant formula, requires a unique assessment that addresses the physiological development of the human infant below 12 weeks of age. The evolution of infant food risk assessment has been recently applied to both the reevaluation of existing infant formula ingredients and the evaluation of innovative new ingredients. A model that has been developed and applied mimicking human early life development most closely compared to other animal species is the farm mini piglet model (P. Hanlon).  

This blog reports on the Symposium Session titled “Toxicological and Regulatory Considerations for Emerging Technologies and Hot Topics in Food” that was held during the 2025 SOT Annual Meeting and ToxExpo. An on-demand recording of this session is available for meeting registrants on the SOT Online Planner and SOT Event App. 

This blog was prepared by an SOT Reporter and represents the views of the author. SOT Reporters are SOT members who volunteer to write about sessions and events in which they participate during the SOT Annual Meeting and ToxExpo. SOT does not propose or endorse any position by posting this article. If you are interested in participating in the SOT Reporter program in the future, please email SOT Headquarters. 


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