US military developing Star Trek-like 3D food printer to improve awful MRE rations

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Tweet Follow @narbasofficial There are a lot of considerations that go into designing the rations that US soldiers take into the field. The foods need to be non-perishable, compact, nutritious, and lightweight. For the last few decades, food scientists have been striving to combine those qualities as best they can in the Meal, Ready-to-Eat (MRE) packages. They’ll keep you fed, but making them actually taste good is of secondary importance. 3D printing might soon be able to rescue soldiers from the unappetizing nightmare that is the traditional MRE, while also conserving resources.
Consumer 3D printers like the MakerBot and food-centric ChefJet lay down layers of material to build a three-dimensional object. In the case of the ChefJet, it’s using a sugary slurry to make tiny candies, but the MakerBot can use a variety of plastics to build whatever you want (even a human heart). The main technology being investigated by US Army researchers is different — it’s called ultrasonic agglomeration. This is a new approach to both 3D printing and food production.

In ultrasonic agglomeration, high-frequency sound waves are projected at target particles, causing them to clump together. Careful modulation of the sound can be used to control how the fragmented food constituents bind together. So why go to all that trouble? 3D printing could allow scientists to create additional menu options that are sufficiently compact and stable to be packaged in MREs. That’s a big deal considering how hard it can be to adapt simple foods to MREs — the army only figured out how to make pizza workable last year (pictured top).
The technology is still in the early stages right now. The Army is focusing on printing small, compact snack foods with ultrasonic agglomeration. That application makes the most sense with current technology, but researchers think it can be augmented with traditional 3D printing techniques to create more complicated and stable foods like pasta.
As the technology advances, meals could be custom generated for each soldier. For example, if your levels of vitamin D are low, your 3D-printed MRE might contain extra vitamin supplements. Right now ultrasonic 3D printers are experimental and confined to the lab. However, the day might come when a unit in the field could be outfitted with a 3D printer to create meals from bulk ingredients as needed with the tastes of the soldiers in mind. One person could print up some pasta and another has pizza. Giving the people what they want would probably result in much less waste as well. [Read: What is 3D printing?]
Researchers envision a future version of 3D food printing that might make it possible for soldiers to essentially forage for raw materials to feed into the printer. If that ever comes to pass, it could make combat units more flexible. Military technology often finds its way into the consumer space eventually, so perhaps one day you’ll have an ultrasonic food printer in your kitchen that churns out ravioli one minute and burgers the next — almost like a Star Trek-style replicator.
Link:extremetech