Science: Mechanical Cow

Millions of mankind are starved for protein in the midst of plenty; protein exists in grass, leaves, and even weeds, but in a form indigestible to human stomachs. Most widely used device for converting protein into edible form is the common cow. But in many tropical areas, where protein starvation is most acute, cows are scarce and do not thrive. Last week, in London’s industrial East End, British Inventor Israel Harris Chayen of British Glues & Chemicals, Ltd. proudly displayed a climateproof mechanical cow. Chewing its cud with the rumble of a bomber squadron, the 50-ft. machine briskly chomped up vegetable matter at one end, spewed out at the other edible, nutritious protein in the form of a flour.

35,000 Shocks. Central element of the machine is the impulse Tenderer. A stream of water carrying animal or vegetable matter is fed into it. As the water flows through, beaters moving with a linear velocity of 22,000 feet per minute produce a series of shock waves at the rate of 35,000 per minute. These shock waves, traveling through the water, break open the cells in much the way that a depth charge can crack a submarine’s hull, and the cell’s contents—mostly water, protein, and fat or oil—spill out. The slurry is passed through a screen and centrifuge to remove fibrous material and insoluble carbohydrates. Then the protein is separated from the oil by commercial solvents, and dried. The result is a white, odorless, tasteless powder, which can be baked in bread or added to almost any food. Two ounces a day is enough to complete a man’s diet, and the cost is only a few cents.

Grass & Ferns. The impulse Tenderer is actually more efficient than a cow, since it diverts none of its food to its own uses. One hundred pounds of ordinary fresh-cut grass yield 3 to 4 lbs. of protein, 8.5 Ibs. of fiber and ½ lb. of syrup containing vitamins, hormones and steroids. The fiber can be made into various sorts of fiber-boards or used for fires in fuel-poor countries that burn dried cow dung. Chayen’s machine can also digest ferns, weeds, leaves of jungle trees.

In Nigeria, a leading export is peanuts. When oil is extracted from peanuts by normal methods, the residue is a rough oil cake, fit only for animals. But a few of Chayen’s mechanical cows could digest Nigeria’s whole crop, extracting both oil and edible protein. The oil and other byproducts could be exported, earning as much money as exporting the peanuts whole, and the protein could be retained to correct Nigeria’s protein-deficient diet. A machine digesting four tons of peanuts per hour would cost only $700,000, and it would supply enough protein for a city of 250,000 people. “It is no longer inevitable,” says Chayen, “that the majority of the population of this earth should suffer from gross and chronic malnutrition. There is abundant protein for all, growing around them. They now have the means with which to help themselves.”