Is lab-grown meat really a solution to climate change?

We’ve got a great list of stories in this week’s New Scientist round-up, with everything from coffee to quantum computers. You can also read my plea for artificial intelligences to start paying their way and take out a New Scientist subscription!

Lab-grown meat could be 25 times worse for the climate than beef

Meat grown in vats from cultured cells is often touted as a solution to the thorny issue of the environmental impacts of rearing cattle and other animals, but a big question is whether it can be scaled up to feed us all. Now, an analysis shows that, at scale, lab-grown meat could actually emit far more greenhouse gases than traditional agriculture because of the energy required to produce the pharmaceutical-grade components used to produce it. The industry hopes that less pure “food-grade” components will bring down the energy needed, but clearly this is a problem that needs to be addressed.

Unevenly packed coffee to blame for weak espresso, say mathematicians

I’m a big fan of coffee – I’m writing this newsletter while sipping my second mug of the day – but not quite enough to bother grinding my own beans. If you’re a more dedicated caffeine fiend than me, you’ll be interested in this story about why grinding coffee beans too finely weakens your espresso, according to mathematicians.

Weird particle that remembers its past discovered by quantum computer

This story has something for both particle physics fans and quantum computing enthusiasts, so what’s not to love? The idea of a particle that can remember where it has been is hard to get your head around, but I like the analogy that my colleague Alex Wilkins came up with, comparing them to the braids within a rope.

More from New Scientist

• Saturn now has more than 100 known moons! But the new ones are quite tiny, so should they really count?
• Our magazine cover story this week is a special guide on how to think about everything from wormholes to the origins of life – dig in and feed your curiosity.
• I’ve written a leader about how artificial intelligences are hoovering up New Scientist’s content without paying for it, which doesn’t seem fair to me.

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Jacob Aron,?News Editor