3-D printing of customized food is on the horizon

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In South Korea, new research aimed at using 3-D printing to create customized food has demonstrated turning powdered ingredients into food that meets individual nutrition requirements.

Jin-Kyu Rhee, associate professor at Ewha Womans University in South Korea said, “We built a platform that uses 3-D printing to create food microstructures that allow food texture and body absorption to be customized on a personal level. We think that one day, people could have cartridges that contain powdered versions of various ingredients that would be put together using 3-D printing and cooked according to the user’s needs or preferences.”

The researchers used a prototype 3-D printer to create food with microstructures that replicated the physical properties and nanoscale texture in actual food samples. Their platform can turn carbohydrate and protein powders into food with microstructures that can be tuned to control food texture and how the food is absorbed by the body.