3-D pizza on Mars? NASA awards grant.
How do you send space travelers off to Mars with enough food to last them the entire journey? You don鈥檛. You print it instead.
In a few short years, hungry meal-goers, in space or otherwise, may be able to 鈥減rint鈥� out pizza, cake, and other entrees with the push of a button, thanks to the ongoing evolution of 3-D printing technology.
3-D printers, which form objects digitally by layering thin sheets of plastic, rubber, and other material atop one another, have emerged as the hot new thing in manufacturing technology in recent years. They鈥檝e been used to create plastic parts, toys, and even a functioning gun.
Now, NASA has awarded a聽 $125,000 grant to develop a food synthesizer to engineer Anjan Contractor and his company, Systems & Materials Research Corp. under its Small Business Innovation Research program. The NASA grant gives Mr. Contractor and SMRC six months to come up with a prototype for the device.
鈥淟ong distance space travel requires 15-plus years of shelf life,鈥� Contractor said in an interview with the news website Quartz. 鈥淭he 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.鈥�
First up on the 3-D menu is pizza, which is an ideal first candidate for 3-D printing because of its individual layers.
Here鈥檚 how it works: With the aid of a 鈥渄igital recipe鈥� the printer combines powders from various flavor cartridges with water and oil in the machine鈥檚 mixing chamber. The mixtures then feed into a system of valves, and each 鈥渓ayer鈥� is squeezed out individually: in the pizza鈥檚 case, the crust comes out first, followed by the sauce, cheese, and protein.
NASA hopes a 3-D food source would provide a solution to fueling astronauts on long space missions. A theoretical trip to Mars, for instance, would take about 520 days one way and require a nutritious food source that won鈥檛 spoil for decades. The food astronauts currently rely on are a lot like military-issued MREs (meals ready to eat), which are highly processed. Printed food, where nutrients and calories could be customized, has the potential to allay some of those issues.
鈥淎s NASA ventures further into space, whether redirecting an asteroid or sending humans to Mars, we will need to make transformation improvements in our life support systems, including how we feed our astronauts during long, deep space missions,鈥� NASA spokesman Allard Beutel told ABC News. 鈥淚n-space and additive manufacturing offers the potential for game-changing weight savings and new mission opportunities, whether 鈥榩rinting鈥� food, tools or entire spacecraft.鈥�
The thought of Mars-bound astronauts having a nutritionally balanced pizza party is captivating, but Contractor sees a more earthbound purpose for 3-D food. Because of its long shelf life and potential for customization, it could solve a wealth of food-related problems, including catering to dietary needs and reducing food waste. 鈥淥ne of the major advantages of a 3-D printer is that it provides personalized nutrition,鈥� Contractor told Quartz. 鈥淚f you鈥檙e male, female 鈥� they all have different dietary needs. If you can program your needs into a 3-D printer, it can print exactly the nutrients that person requires.鈥�
It鈥檚 still early, so it鈥檚 unclear what the limitations of printed food might be. But Contractor preaches that keeping an open mind may be necessary to solve the world鈥檚 food supply problems. "I think, and many economists think, that current food systems can't supply 12 billion people sufficiently," he said. "So we eventually have to change our perception of what we see as food."
