If "you are what you eat," then you could be a kill-free, contamination-free, lab-produced meatball sooner than you think, thanks to a team of researchers at the University of Minnesota.

Lab-produced meat is nothing new. A Dutch team at Maastricht University, headed by scientist Mark Post, was the first to create cultured meat in 2013.

Both teams harvested stem cells from live animals and grew them in a petri dish.

But where it cost Post's team almost $330,00 and took three months to produce their lab-grown burger, it cost Dr. Uma Valeti's team in Minnesota $18,000 and took less than 21 days to grow a meatball.

Dr. Valeti is also the CEO of Memphis Meats, a company that recently received capital for lab cultured beef, pork and chicken products. "Cultured meat will completely replace the status quo and make raising animals to eat them simply unthinkable," he says.

Valeti hopes cultured meats will be available in restaurants and on grocery shelves in the next three to five years.

Read More:

• Indian-American Scientist Has Discovered A Way For Us To Eat Meat Without Killing Animals (Huffington Post)
• A Kill-Free Meat Product May Be Coming To A Grocery Story Near You (ATTN)
• Lab-grown meat is in your future, and it may be healthier than the real stuff (Washington Post)