3D, 4D Food Printing Technology: The Budding Era of Digital Gastronomy

By Team Food Safety Webzine / July 9 / Processing

The taste and appreciation of food being typically subjective, the customization of food is important. Fabrication of food by precise printing of food mix is widely recognized. Advancement in digital technologies such as multidimensional food printing has enabled food making with definite composition and micro structure. Food products are rapidly evolving; therefore, all professionals in the food manufacturing field need to follow up on the latest trends being the need of the hour.

3D printing is a digitalized manufacturing method in which the product is built layer-by-layer suited for creating customized food with complex geometries, tailored texture and nutritional content. The layers are bonded together either by phase transitions or chemical reactions. This technique is also known as Additive Manufacturing (AM).

The concept of 4D printing is ascribed to the extension of 3D printing with the addition of  time dimension. Here, the objects are designed with continuous layers of stimuli-responsive composite materials, which can alter shapes once removed after the 3D printing process. The stimuli for this physical (shape or colour) or chemical change in the state over time can be from the natural environment or through human intervention. Figure 1 compares the 3D and 4D food printing methods.

Figure 1. Comparison of 3D and 4D food printing methods

Importance of digital food printing

Food researchers emphasize food customization concerning health aspects. The consumers are self-aware of their nutritional requirements demanding healthier choices. Besides, the issue of food wastage in food sector is also growing. A remedy to all this relies on ‘on-demand manufacturing’ or ‘tailored production’ of food.

Food quality attributes to be considered by any food manufacturer is appearance, composition and nutrition. In food printing methods, a broad category of ingredients including fruits and vegetables, and their by-products can be used, which is unlike the conventional methods such as extrusion. Further, in extrusion, the quality of the end product quality is highly dependent on temperature, pressure and shear. A few of the benefits of 3D, 4D food printing methods are presented in Figure 2.

Figure 2. Benefits of 3D, 4D food printing methods

3D, 4D food printing process

The 3D printing technique is accepted widely for its diverse applications in allied fields. In the food sector food printing allows users to fabricate foods with customized shapes, color, flavor, and nutritional needs. 3D food printing process (shown in Figure 3) contribute to sensorial profile and has a decisive effect on the mechanical properties of the food. Also, one can manipulate the fabrication process to meet customer expectation with the digital control over the material feeding system. However, optimizing the working parameters in 3D printing process is a crucial to yield foods that stand out as quality parameters to conventional foods.

Figure 3. Schematic flow diagram of the typical 3D printing process

3D, 4D food printing equipment

Several 3D printing models are available worldwide to accomplish 3D, 4D printing (few of them are presented below). In general, the printers are capable of printing customized products like pizza, pasta, chocolate, cookies and sugar cubes. Figure 4, shows a chocolate 3D printer developed by Procusini, a German-based company, targeting the infant food industry. Ongoing 3D food fabrication researches orient towards the printing of meat and probiotics incorporated foods.

Figure 4. (a) 3D printed chocolate (b) A commercial 3D food printer

3D printer model Company Target products

Chefjet™ Cocojet 3D Systems Chocolate

Foodini™ Natural Machines Pizza, cookies

CandyFab 3D printer Evil Mad Science Sugar-based confectionary

PancakeBot™ Digital Food Lab Pancakes

3D pasta printer Barilla Pasta

Nufood 3D Food printer Dovetailed Fruit-based confectionary

Concluding remarks

For the past years, two-dimensional food printing in the form of text or graphics on cakes or cookies are widely available. The approaches of 3D, 4D printing enable the food manufacturing with a wider perspective of complex geometry and shapes in a relatively shorter period. The main advantage here is the lack of laborious and time-consuming unit operations, which is unlike the conventional food processing methods. However, the limitations of 3D, 4D food printing are its relative higher working time, tedious optimization of working parameters, and the costly equipment.

Presently, research on food printing aims to combine 3D, 4D printing with other established technologies like electrospinning and microencapsulation for improved nutritional profile. Despite, 3D, 4D printing is suitable to fortify food with micronutrients to combat malnutrition and nutrient deficiency. Moreover, whence the technology is accessible by small-scale processing units, its consistent use for novel consumer foods is at vicinity.