NASA Gives Grant to Develop 3D-printable Food

Sometime in the not too distant future, an astronaut in the middle of a long-haul voyage may get a little homesick and float over to his spaceship's kitchen to print a slice of pizza and, for a few bites, enjoy a creature comfort of Earth from millions of miles away.

The technology is only in its nascent stages, and it's light years away before a Star Trek-like "replicator" device is popping out Zagat-rated interstellar fare, but a $125,000 NASA grant to a mechanical engineer with a background in 3D printing is warming the oven for the future of eating: printable food.

NASA, via its Small Business Innovation Research program, awarded Anjan Contractor and his company Systems & Materials Research Corporation the money to create a prototype of the 3D food printer.

Contractor's system is reliant on cartridges of powder and oil that, when combined and re-hydrated, can be printed, layer by layer, into edible objects, according to a report by Quartz.

"Long distance space travel requires 15-plus years of shelf life," Contractor said to 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."

An obvious candidate for trial runs is pizza because the dish only required the 3D printer's head to extrude one component at a time. The printer would create a layer of dough that bakes at the same time it's printed by a heated plate at the bottom of the printed. Then comes the sauce, which Contractor told Quartz is "also stored in a powdered form, and then mixed with water and oil." A final "protein layer" could be a combination of plants, dairy or even meat.

The video below shows a prototype of a 3D printer, extruding a layer of chocolate.