Data and Supplemental Figures from: Effect of pH adjustments on a novel micellar casein-based edible 3D printing formulation

Three-dimensional (3D) food printing holds the potential to help reduce food waste by precise portion control and use of materials that are produced in excess or are otherwise discarded. This relatively new technology is likely to undergo decreases in equipment costs. To take advantage of such prospects, we developed a novel micellar casein–based edible 3D printing formulation. Our formulation relies on a highly concentrated micellar casein solution (27.75%, wt/wt, final) along with pH adjustments (3.5, 4.0, 4.8, 6.7, 7.2, and 8.2) at chilled temperature (4-9°C) to avoid premature aggregation. In comparison to the natural pH of 6.7, both alkalinization and acidification past the isoelectric point of 4.6 enhanced both elastic and viscous moduli that enable for shape retention during and after extrusion from a 3D food printer. However, alkalinization led to smaller increases in the viscous modulus and did not lead to the shape retention that acidification to 4.0 or 3.5 does. Both acidification and alkalinization also resulted in rougher surface textures compared with the formulation at pH 6.7. Whereas the pH 4.8 formulation had inferior shape retention qualities compared with those at the other pH values tested, it had optimized water resilience, defined here as minimized swelling and dissolution of dried structures placed in water. Overall, we present a novel casein-based 3D printing formulation that could be printed while chilled, and with properties that could be modified by pH adjustments.

Data and Resources

Field Value
accessLevel public
bureauCode {005:18}
catalog_@context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
catalog_conformsTo https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
catalog_describedBy https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
identifier 10.15482/USDA.ADC/28370015.v1
license https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
modified 2025-02-20
programCode {005:040}
publisher Agricultural Research Service
resource-type Dataset
source_datajson_identifier true
source_hash 6b4ba18d197a91a95d609a65c34636fe40c26e48e7d454a2a7be042dc32a9d7d
source_schema_version 1.1
temporal 2024-01-02/2024-01-02
Groups
  • AmeriGEOSS
  • National Provider
  • North America
Tags
  • 3d-printing
  • AmeriGEO
  • AmeriGEOSS
  • CKAN
  • GEO
  • GEOSS
  • National
  • North America
  • United States
  • extrusion-rate
  • microscopy
  • supplemental-file
isopen True
license_id cc-zero
license_title Creative Commons CCZero
license_url http://www.opendefinition.org/licenses/cc-zero
maintainer McAnulty, Michael
maintainer_email michael.mcanulty@usda.gov
metadata_created 2025-09-23T19:47:29.859195
metadata_modified 2025-09-23T19:47:29.859200
notes <p dir="ltr">Three-dimensional (3D) food printing holds the potential to help reduce food waste by precise portion control and use of materials that are produced in excess or are otherwise discarded. This relatively new technology is likely to undergo decreases in equipment costs. To take advantage of such prospects, we developed a novel micellar casein–based edible 3D printing formulation. Our formulation relies on a highly concentrated micellar casein solution (27.75%, wt/wt, final) along with pH adjustments (3.5, 4.0, 4.8, 6.7, 7.2, and 8.2) at chilled temperature (4-9°C) to avoid premature aggregation. In comparison to the natural pH of 6.7, both alkalinization and acidification past the isoelectric point of 4.6 enhanced both elastic and viscous moduli that enable for shape retention during and after extrusion from a 3D food printer. However, alkalinization led to smaller increases in the viscous modulus and did not lead to the shape retention that acidification to 4.0 or 3.5 does. Both acidification and alkalinization also resulted in rougher surface textures compared with the formulation at pH 6.7. Whereas the pH 4.8 formulation had inferior shape retention qualities compared with those at the other pH values tested, it had optimized water resilience, defined here as minimized swelling and dissolution of dried structures placed in water. Overall, we present a novel casein-based 3D printing formulation that could be printed while chilled, and with properties that could be modified by pH adjustments.</p>
num_resources 8
num_tags 12
title Data and Supplemental Figures from: Effect of pH adjustments on a novel micellar casein-based edible 3D printing formulation