Growing and culturing

Crystals or living cells are grown under tightly controlled conditions until there is enough to harvest.

74 lines that use it

Almonds 4 stations Apples 4 stations Baker's yeast 6 stations · 3 raw sources Baking soda 6 stations · 9 raw sources Bamboo 4 stations Barley 3 stations Beeswax 5 stations · 1 raw source Blue agave 5 stations Cabbage 5 stations Castor beans 3 stations Cattle 3 stations Chickens 3 stations Chili pepper 5 stations Cocoa beans 4 stations Coconuts 4 stations Coffee cherries 3 stations Cork oak bark 3 stations Corn 3 stations Cucumber 4 stations Cultured pearl 6 stations · 2 raw sources Durum wheat 3 stations Eggs 3 stations Flax 3 stations Hazelnuts 4 stations Honeycomb 4 stations Hops 3 stations Insulin 7 stations · 11 raw sources Juniper berries 3 stations Koji 5 stations · 3 raw sources Lab-grown diamond 6 stations · 3 raw sources LED 8 stations · 10 raw sources Malted barley 5 stations · 2 raw sources Matcha 5 stations · 1 raw source mRNA vaccine 7 stations · 11 raw sources Mustard seed 3 stations Natural rubber latex 3 stations Nori 6 stations · 1 raw source Oats 3 stations Oil palm fruit 3 stations Olives 5 stations Onions 5 stations Oranges 3 stations Peanuts 5 stations Pearl oysters 5 stations Peas 4 stations Penicillin 7 stations · 11 raw sources Pigs 4 stations Potatoes 4 stations Rapeseed 5 stations Raw cotton 3 stations Raw milk 3 stations Rice 3 stations Rye 5 stations Sake 8 stations · 14 raw sources Scotch whisky 7 stations · 19 raw sources Seaweed 3 stations Silicon wafer 6 stations · 8 raw sources Silk 6 stations · 4 raw sources Silk cocoons 4 stations Soy sauce 7 stations · 6 raw sources Soybeans 3 stations Sugar 8 stations · 4 raw sources Sugar beet 3 stations Sugarcane 4 stations Tea leaves 3 stations Timber 5 stations Tomatoes 5 stations Turbine blade 8 stations · 20 raw sources Vanilla extract 7 stations · 7 raw sources Vanilla pods 3 stations Vinegar 6 stations · 8 raw sources Wheat 3 stations Wine grapes 5 stations Wool fleece 3 stations

What it looks like on the line

EggsKeep laying hens. The wild Asian fowl that chickens descend from lay about a dozen eggs each breeding season. Selective breeding now gives hens that lay more than three hundred eggs a year and lay all year round.
TomatoesPlant into mulched beds. Once soil 3 inches down reaches 60 °F, a transplanter sets the seedlings into raised beds covered in red or black plastic. Drip lines deliver water and fertilizer for the rest of the season.
CucumberGrow under the canopy. Large leaves form a canopy over the developing fruit and shade it. Greenhouse growers often use varieties that set seedless fruit with no pollination at all.
Raw cottonPlant in a frost-free field. Cotton needs a long stretch without frost, lots of sunshine and moderate rainfall, usually 50 to 100 cm a year. Heavy soils suit it, and much of today's crop is irrigated in drier regions. Bt varieties carry a bacterial gene that kills bollworms.
SakeGrow the koji mold. Spores of the fungus Aspergillus oryzae are scattered over part of the steamed rice. In a warm, moist room the mold grows and releases enzymes that cut starch into glucose and maltose.
ChickensHatch the eggs. A fertile chicken egg hatches after about 21 days. The chick breaks out of the shell with an egg tooth and lives off the yolk sac for the first day or so.
NoriSeed the nets. Nori farmers seed nets with young Pyropia and suspend them at the sea surface, working from boats. About 45 days pass before the first harvest.
VinegarAdd the acid bacteria. A starter, sometimes called mother of vinegar, brings in acetic acid bacteria. Traditional makers let a slime-like mat of the bacteria float on the surface of barrels.
Vanilla podsTrain the vine. Vanilla climbs a tree or frame, such as bamboo or coconut, in a hot, humid climate with about 80% humidity. It does best within 10 to 20 degrees of the equator and in loose soil rich in organic matter.
Vanilla podsPollinate each flower by hand. Without pollination a blossom wilts and falls, and wild vanilla has only a 1% chance of it. A worker lifts a flap in the flower with a wood splinter and presses the anther against the stigma. It has to be done within 12 hours of the flower opening.
CattleBreed the cows. Gestation takes about nine months. Many farms use artificial insemination, which lets a farmer choose from many bulls. Calves are born roughly 52:48 male to female.
Oil palm fruitLet insects pollinate. The palm is pollinated almost entirely by insects, not wind. An African insect, Elaeidobius kamerunicus, was deliberately introduced to southeast Asia in 1981 with dramatic results.