대표 연구진의
식품 구조·물성 연구 논문

As Korea enters a super-aged society, the need for foods that can support both safe intake and adequate nutrition in older adults is becoming increasingly important. This article reviews the current state of 3D food printing technology and discusses its application potential and practical challenges in elderly-friendly food manufacturing. Conventional elderly-friendly foods have contributed to improving ease of intake, but they still have limitations in reflecting individual differences in chewing and swallowing ability, diversifying meal forms, and supporting personalized nutritional design. In this context, 3D food printing has gained attention as a promising manufacturing technology because it allows simultaneous design of food shape, composition, and texture. In food applications, extrusion-based printing is mainly used, and the design of printable food inks is a key prerequisite. To achieve stable printing, food inks should exhibit appropriate rheological properties so that extrusion, layer formation, and shape retention can be secured in a balanced manner. In addition, process conditions should be optimized together with material properties to improve structural accuracy, reproducibility, and quality stability after post-processing. Recent studies have focused mainly on dysphagia-oriented food design, structural reproduction, and texture control, with gradual expansion toward nutritional enhancement. However, practical application still requires further work on quality reproducibility, post-processing stability, and evaluation systems linking process conditions, material properties, and intake suitability. These aspects will be critical for the industrial use of 3D food printing in elderly-friendly food manufacturing.