In Dinner on Mars, [Evan] Fraser and co-author Lenore Newman — Canada Research Chair in Food Security and the Environment at the University of the Fraser Valley — delved into the agricultural technologies that will make feeding the red planet possible.

Newman and Fraser’s thought experiment of what people would eat in their imaginary Martian settlement of BaseTown also serves as a lesson in how we might improve food systems here on Earth.

In the next 10 years, Fraser expects “remarkable advances” in precision fermentation. He predicts that though cellular agriculture won’t completely overtake its animal-based counterpart, it will help define how we feed ourselves in the future.

Products such as chicken nuggets, frozen beef burritos, ice cream and industrial cheese will become less dependent on animals and more dependent on microbes for their ingredients.

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