3D food printing

Draft

Introduction

3D food printers can print food, usually through one more syringes. Food 3D printers actually were invented around the same time as low cost filament printers, but did not have much success. The first known open source printers capable of printing food were probably developed at Cornell University around 2005 under the name of fablab@home by Hod Lipson and collaborators.

As of 2017 however, there is renewed interest. 3D food printing can server two purposes according to 3D Food Printing: It can be healthy and good for the environment because it can help to convert alternative ingredients such as proteins from algae, beet leaves, or insects into tasty products. It also opens the door to food customization and therefore tune up with individual needs and preferences.

According to Sun et al (2015), “Three-dimensional (3D) Food Printing, also known as Food Layered Manufacture (Wegrzyn et al. 2012), can be one of the potential ways to bridge this gap. It is a digitally controlled, robotic construction process which can build up complex 3D food products layer by layer (Huang et al. 2013). It has started a revolution in cooking by precisely mixing, depositing, and cooking layers of ingredients, so that users can easily and rapidly experiment with different material combinations. With this technology, food can be designed and fabricated to meet individual needs on health condition and physical activities through controlling the amount of printing material and nutrition content.”

See also: food computer

Technology

Most 3D food printers adopt some kind of additive filament deposition technology, e.g. they work like most 3D hobby printers, except that the plastic filament is replaced by syringue that are filled with some paste.

The Choc Creator

According to 2007 - 2017: 10 years of 3D chocolate printing (retrieved Feb 2017), ChocALM (2007) from Exeter University was maybe the The World's First 3-D Chocolate Printer. The first model was commercialized in 2012 as Choc Creator V.1. As of 2017 Choc Creator V.20 plus is sold by Choc Edge.

Technical specifications of the Choc Creator V2.0:

• The printer uses STL files for Additive Layer Manufactoring. The chocolate must be tempered first and then loaded into a specially designed syringe.
• Build envelope: 180x180x50mm
• Printhead: Refillable 30ml metal syringe with detachable nozzle for easy cleaning
• Layer height: 0.4 – 1.5mm
• Nozzle size: either 0.4 or 0.8 mm (the later is better for extended print time)
• Substrate: Stainless steel platform
• Material: Dark Belgian chocolate (Callebaut 811)
• Weight: 18kg
• Display interface: LCD touchscreen
• Software: Choc Art Studio
• Easy to use software: Android apps
• Price: about 2800 Euros + about 500 Euros or more for a tempering machine (but one also could use a micro oven)

Sintering

CandyFab 6000

Candyfab were “able to print very large objects out of pure sugar, very inexpensively, by melting sugar grains together with hot air, using a novel process called selective hot air sintering and melting (SHASAM). The general idea of the build process, that of stacking solid two-dimensional printed layers, is common to all 3D printing methods. CandyFab, like other powder-based printers, begins with a bed of granular printing media — typically granulated sugar.” (retrieved Feb 2007).

The hot air sintering process is described as follows: “Using a narrow, directed, low-velocity beam of hot air, the CandyFab selectively fuses together the print media grains, forming a two-dimensional image out of fused media. We then lower the bed by a small amount, add a thin flat layer of media to the top of the bed, and selectively fuse the media in the new layer, forming a two dimensional image that is also fused to any overlapping fused areas in the layer below. By repeating this process, a three-dimensional object is slowly built up. At the end of the build, the bed is raised up to its original position, disinterring the fabricated model, while unused media is reclaimed for use in building the next object.” (Candyfab wiki, retrieved Feb 2017).

Materials

Most popular materials seem to be chocolate or dough for cookies.

However, according to , “Alternative ingredients extracted from algae, fungi, seaweed, lupine, and insects are novel sources for protein and fiber. In the “Insects Au Gratin” project, insect powders mixed with extrudable icing and soft cheese were used as printing materials to shape food structures and make tasty pieces (Walters et al. 2011). Residues from the current agricultural and food processing can be transformed to biologically active metabolites, enzymes, and food flavor compounds (Silva et al. 2007; Nikitina et al. 2007), as sustainable and eco-friendly printing material sources.”. In other words, this technology does have potential to develop healthier food, improve environmental impact and help feed an ever growing population.

3D food printers in education

In general education there may be some potential for food 3D printing, e.g. for teaching design (and related soft skills), plus some technical skills.

Links

Introductions etc.

• Why 3D food printing is more than just a novelty — it’s the future of food by Kyle Wiggers, April 2015.

• printed food, a growing market
• Do We Really Want 3D-Printed Food?, by Lara Sorakanich, Dec 2016.
• food category at 3dprinting.com

Organizations and events

• https://3dfoodprintingconference.com/

Printer models

• food at 3dprintersonlinstore
• Fab@Home from Cornell (no longer availabe)
• Choc Edge

Rather high end:

• Foodini
• Bocusini

Bibliography

Cited with foot notes

Other

• Cohen, D. L., Jeffrey, I. L., Cutler, M., Coulter, D., Vesco, A., & Lipson, H. (2009). Hydrocolloid printing: a novel platform for customized food production. In: Proceedings of solid freeform fabrication symposium (SFF'09), 3–5 August 2009, Austin, TX, USA.

• Huang, S. H., Liu, P., & Mokasdar, A. (2013). Additive manufacturing and its societal impact: a literature review. The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology, 67(5–8), 1191–1203.

• Hao, L., Mellor, S., Seaman, O., Henderson, J., Sewell, N., & Sloan, M. (2010). Material characterisation and process development for chocolate additive layer manufacturing. Virtual and Physical Prototyping, 5, 57–64. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17452751003753212

• Lipton, J.I., Arnold, D. Nigl, F., Lopez, N., Cohen, D.L., Noren, N., Lipson, H. (2010) “Multi-Material Food Printing with Complex Internal Structure Suitable for Conventional Post-Processing”, 21st Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium (SFF ’10), Austin, TX.

• Lipson, H., & Kurman, M. (2013). Fabricated: The new world of 3D printing. John Wiley & Sons.

• Lipton, J., Arnold, D., Nigl, F., Lopez, N., Cohen, D. L., Norén, N., & Lipson, H. (2010, August). Multi-material food printing with complex internal structure suitable for conventional post-processing. In Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium (pp. 809-815). PDF

• Nikitina, V. E., Tsivileva, O. M., & Pankratov, A. N. (2007). Lentinula edodes biotechnology - from lentinan to lectins. Food and Bioprocess Technology, 45, 230–237.

• Silva, É. S., Cavallazzi, J. R. P., & Muller, G. (2007). Biotechnological applications of Lentinus edodes. Journal of Food, Agriculture and Environment, 5, 403–407.

• Walters, P., Huson, D., & Southerland, D. (2011). Edible 3D printing, In: Proceedings of 27th international conference on digital printing technologies, October 2011, Minnesota, USA

• Wegrzyn, T. F., Golding, M., & Archer, R. H. (2012). Food layered manufacture: a new process for constructing solid foods. Trends in Food Science & Technology, 27(2), 66–72.