Your favorite chocolate treats can’t be made without one essential ingredient—cocoa! It comes from the beans of the cacao tree. But extreme heat and drought have been hurting cacao trees around the world. Cocoa supplies have dropped, so chocolate prices have risen.
Now some companies are trying a new way to make chocolate. They’re growing it in a lab! First, workers remove cells, the smallest part of a living thing, from a cacao bean. They place the cells in a dish with a mixture of water, sugar, and other nutrients. The cells multiply. Then workers use them to make cocoa.
The lab-grown cacao cells have the same parts as the original ones. This means the new treats should taste like the yummy chocolate we know and love.