Rotational Digital Light Processing for Edible Scaffold Fabrication
Abstract
A key hurdle to overcome in the development of alternative meat-based protein is the manipulation
of mechanical or mastic properties of the 3D scaffolds. These properties influence the mouth feel
of the product and must be tunable to achieve a variety of meat analogous textures. The goal of
this research was to investigate a printing technology hypothesized to enable textural adjustment
in alternative proteins. In pursuit of this goal, a novel digital light processing (DLP) printer with a
rotational collector plate was developed to enable radially cured layers with the ability to
incorporate multi-material composite structures. The purpose of this research was to quantify the
effect of cured layer orientation on the bulk mechanical properties of (gelatin methacryloyl)
GelMA scaffolds. In addition, current photocrosslinking systems do not emphasize the edibility of
the materials used in the process. Tartrazine, an edible photo-absorber, was investigated in its use
for improving print resolution during the crosslinking process.