3-D Food Printer: The End of Hunger?

Food lovers, it's time to rejoice! With NASA funding the development of the world's first ever 3-D food printer, very soon, we may be able to 'print and eat' our very own pizza. Aimed at reducing hunger in the world, and in the 'space,' NASA has awarded a whopping $125,000 grant to a research project, which aims at developing a 3-D food printer to help reduce the issues associated with storage of food for long term during space trips for astronauts. Creator Anjan Contractor hopes to help people on the earth too, with this initiative, with an idea to help people on the earth get easy access to the volume and variety of food that is required.

Systems and Materials Research Corporation, led by Mechanical Engineer Anjan Contractor, is all set to start with pizza as their first initiative in their 3-D printed food.

This may be complex, as pizza is a dish that involves many ingredients, and works in layers, but with the success of this printed dish, there will be no sad, powder-fed astronauts.

The 3-D food printer is assumed to start with mixing and depositing a layer of dough, followed by a tomato sauce made from a mixture of tomato powder, water and oil. Though this printed pizza will have no meat or cheese, it may still be a boon for the astronauts, who survive years in space with freeze-dried and powdered foods.

"Long distance space travel requires 15-plus years of shelf life," Contractor told Quartz. "The way we are working on it is, all the carbs, proteins and macro and micro nutrients are in powder form. We take moisture out, and in that form it will last maybe 30 years."

"I think, and many economists think, that current food systems can't supply 12 billion people sufficiently," he added. "So we eventually have to change our perception of what we see as food."

With new initiatives to curb hunger in the world, including encouraging consumption of insects, this one may prove to be a much more 'ethical' and satisfying innovation.

Printed burgers anyone? 

Source-Medindia