Home-baked idea? Nasa mulls 3D printers for food replication ...
Jun 4, 2013 - New technology could have wider commercial application or even aid the fight against world hunger.
Home-baked idea? Nasa mulls 3D printers for food replication
New technology could have wider commercial application or even aid the fight against world hunger
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Light refreshment ...
astronaut Loren Shriver eats floating sweets on the Atlantis shuttle
during its orbit of the earth in 1992. Photograph: Space Frontiers/Getty
Images
Nasa
can send robots to Mars, no problem. But if it's ever going to put
humans on the red planet, it has to figure out how to feed them over the
course of a years-long mission. So the space
agency has funded research for what could be the ultimate nerd
solution: a 3D printer that creates entrees or desserts at the touch of a
button.
Yes, it's another case of life imitating Star Trek (remember the food replicator?). In this case, though, the creators hope there is an application beyond deep-space pizza parties. The technology could also be used to feed the hungry on Earth.
Texas-based Systems and Materials Research has been selected for a $125,000 grant from Nasa to develop a 3D printer that will create "nutritious and flavourful" food suitable for astronauts, according to the company's proposal. Using a "digital recipe", the printers will combine powders to produce food that has the structure and texture of, well, actual food. Including smell.
The project was presented at the Humans 2 Mars summit in Washington last month. At the presentation, Anjan Contractor, an engineer at SMRC and the project manager, explained how the idea originated: he had used a 3D printer to print chocolate for his wife.
The chocolate experiment led the company to think about other kinds of food that could be printed. A space-food printer doesn't actually exist yet – it's still a concept, which the company hopes to develop by the end of the year using Nasa's grant money.
The space agency's current astro-food system "is not adequate in nutrition or acceptability through the five-year shelf life required for a mission to Mars, or other long-duration missions", Nasa spokesman David Steitz said.
Astronauts carry pre-packaged food – not the freeze-dried ice cream for sale in Smithsonian gift shops, but a little like the meals ready to eat, or MREs, consumed by the military. The preparations are short on flavour and heavy on processing, which tends to "degrade the micronutrients in the foods", Steitz said. There also isn't much choice or variety, since all combinations of food are predetermined. That can take on big significance after a year or three cooped up in a small metal capsule.
In its proposal, the company said 3D printed food could be tailored to each individual astronaut's nutritional needs, improving health and, maybe more importantly, alleviating boredom.
One of the first goals for SMRC's printer is the pizza. It was chosen because it contains a variety of nutrients and flavours, said David Irvin, director of research at SMRC. More importantly, a pizza is made up of layers, a key principle used in 3D printing technology.
Such printers, which have seen a surge of popularity, build a three-dimensional object by adding successive layers of material millions of times over according to a digital blueprint. Hobbyists have been using them to make everything from plastic toys to functioning guns.
In SMRC's proposal, all the nutrients that go into a meal – such as protein and carbohydrates – would be stored in powdered form in cartridges. When an astronaut chooses a recipe, all the ingredients are deployed into a mixing chamber, where they are blended with water and oil.
The mixture is then heated and sprayed on to a heated base. Layer by layer, the food is formed on the base, until it is ready, fresh from the "oven".
"The pizza is actually just a way to demonstrate something solid at the bottom, something doughy in the middle and something meatlike at the top," Irvin said.
Theoretically, homesick astronauts could even get a care package from mum: the printer would have the ability to communicate with Earth and receive personalised instructions, or "recipes", the company said.
"Mom designs a cookie in a computer, sends the cookie to the space shuttle and the son or daughter prints out a cookie at Christmas," Contractor said in his presentation.
Nasa said the proposal is intriguing in part because it could save weight on a spacecraft, and because such technology could be used to make other objects, such as tools.
Using 3D printers to make food is not new. In 2011, Cornell University designed a printer that could create food using pastes moving through a syringe.
A Dutch research company, TNO, floated the idea that 3D printers could use organic life as a protein component – algae, grass or even insects.
SMRC said part of its motivation for seeking the Nasa grant is to pursue the even loftier goal of fighting world hunger.
At his Washington presentation, Contractor said printed food could increase the efficiency of food systems on Earth by eliminating waste and making it easier to store and transport nutritional ingredients. The company also envisions printing food for military use, which could cut down on supply runs.
But experts caution against viewing technology as the answer to the world's nutritional issues.
"There isn't some silver-bullet technology that's going to solve hunger problems," said Gawain Kripke, policy director for food security and hunger at Oxfam America. The idea behind the technology is welcome, he said, but is unlikely to have an impact in the near term.
"What's more likely to have an impact is simpler technology, such as access to tractors and seeds," he said.
This article appeared in Guardian Weekly, which incorporates material from the Washington Post
end quote from:
Yes, it's another case of life imitating Star Trek (remember the food replicator?). In this case, though, the creators hope there is an application beyond deep-space pizza parties. The technology could also be used to feed the hungry on Earth.
Texas-based Systems and Materials Research has been selected for a $125,000 grant from Nasa to develop a 3D printer that will create "nutritious and flavourful" food suitable for astronauts, according to the company's proposal. Using a "digital recipe", the printers will combine powders to produce food that has the structure and texture of, well, actual food. Including smell.
The project was presented at the Humans 2 Mars summit in Washington last month. At the presentation, Anjan Contractor, an engineer at SMRC and the project manager, explained how the idea originated: he had used a 3D printer to print chocolate for his wife.
The chocolate experiment led the company to think about other kinds of food that could be printed. A space-food printer doesn't actually exist yet – it's still a concept, which the company hopes to develop by the end of the year using Nasa's grant money.
The space agency's current astro-food system "is not adequate in nutrition or acceptability through the five-year shelf life required for a mission to Mars, or other long-duration missions", Nasa spokesman David Steitz said.
Astronauts carry pre-packaged food – not the freeze-dried ice cream for sale in Smithsonian gift shops, but a little like the meals ready to eat, or MREs, consumed by the military. The preparations are short on flavour and heavy on processing, which tends to "degrade the micronutrients in the foods", Steitz said. There also isn't much choice or variety, since all combinations of food are predetermined. That can take on big significance after a year or three cooped up in a small metal capsule.
In its proposal, the company said 3D printed food could be tailored to each individual astronaut's nutritional needs, improving health and, maybe more importantly, alleviating boredom.
One of the first goals for SMRC's printer is the pizza. It was chosen because it contains a variety of nutrients and flavours, said David Irvin, director of research at SMRC. More importantly, a pizza is made up of layers, a key principle used in 3D printing technology.
Such printers, which have seen a surge of popularity, build a three-dimensional object by adding successive layers of material millions of times over according to a digital blueprint. Hobbyists have been using them to make everything from plastic toys to functioning guns.
In SMRC's proposal, all the nutrients that go into a meal – such as protein and carbohydrates – would be stored in powdered form in cartridges. When an astronaut chooses a recipe, all the ingredients are deployed into a mixing chamber, where they are blended with water and oil.
The mixture is then heated and sprayed on to a heated base. Layer by layer, the food is formed on the base, until it is ready, fresh from the "oven".
"The pizza is actually just a way to demonstrate something solid at the bottom, something doughy in the middle and something meatlike at the top," Irvin said.
Theoretically, homesick astronauts could even get a care package from mum: the printer would have the ability to communicate with Earth and receive personalised instructions, or "recipes", the company said.
"Mom designs a cookie in a computer, sends the cookie to the space shuttle and the son or daughter prints out a cookie at Christmas," Contractor said in his presentation.
Nasa said the proposal is intriguing in part because it could save weight on a spacecraft, and because such technology could be used to make other objects, such as tools.
Using 3D printers to make food is not new. In 2011, Cornell University designed a printer that could create food using pastes moving through a syringe.
A Dutch research company, TNO, floated the idea that 3D printers could use organic life as a protein component – algae, grass or even insects.
SMRC said part of its motivation for seeking the Nasa grant is to pursue the even loftier goal of fighting world hunger.
At his Washington presentation, Contractor said printed food could increase the efficiency of food systems on Earth by eliminating waste and making it easier to store and transport nutritional ingredients. The company also envisions printing food for military use, which could cut down on supply runs.
But experts caution against viewing technology as the answer to the world's nutritional issues.
"There isn't some silver-bullet technology that's going to solve hunger problems," said Gawain Kripke, policy director for food security and hunger at Oxfam America. The idea behind the technology is welcome, he said, but is unlikely to have an impact in the near term.
"What's more likely to have an impact is simpler technology, such as access to tractors and seeds," he said.
This article appeared in Guardian Weekly, which incorporates material from the Washington Post
end quote from:
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