A research team led by the Morphing Matter Lab at Carnegie Mellon University is developing flat pasta that forms into familiar shapes when cooked. The team impresses tiny grooves into flat pasta dough made of only semolina flour and water in patt
Morphing Matter Lab. Carnegie Mellon University
Flat-pack furniture is commonplace, and flat-pack pasta might be one day too.
Wen Wang of Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania and her colleagues have developed edible 2D pasta that swells into 3D shapes when cooked, such as long spirals resembling fusilli and saddle shapes similar to conchiglie.
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The researchers believe that flat-pack dry pasta could drastically reduce the amount of packaging required for the foodstuff, as well as saving on storage and transportation space.
For example, when macaroni is packaged, around 60 per cent of the space in the box or bag is air, estimates Wang.
Flat-Packed Noodles Create More Sustainable Packaging, Transportation and Storage Aaron Aupperlee
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A team of researchers led by the Morphing Matter Lab is developing flat pasta that forms familiar shapes when it s cooked. Their work is the cover story in this month s issue of Science Advances.
People love pasta for its shapes from tubes of penne and rigatoni to spirals of fusilli and rotini.
But what makes farfalle different from conchiglie also makes the staple a bear to package, requiring large bags and boxes to accommodate the iconic shapes of pastas around the world.
A research team led by the Morphing Matter Lab at Carnegie Mellon University is developing flat pasta that forms into familiar shapes when cooked. The team impresses tiny grooves into flat pasta dough made of only semolina flour and water in patterns that cause it to morph into tubes, spirals, twists and waves when cooked.