3D Printing Food, Foam And Forces: Additive Manufacturing Of Edible Constructs, Cellular Structures And Actuators

The work presented here advances the field of Additive Manufacturing using direct write processes. Additive manufacturing (AM) is a broad set of processes that apply material, layer by layer to produce an object. Traditionally these processes have been used for rapid prototyping in industry. AM process are valued for their ability to produce objects quickly without custom tooling allowing for small volume production runs and the generation of custom products in a cost effective way. They are also valued for their ability to produce shapes of geometric complexity too difficult or too expensive for other processes to produce. Direct write processes allow for the widest range of material to be additively manufactured and are used from fields as diverse as bio-fabrication to zinc-air battery fabrication. In this thesis I have developed techniques and materials which allow AM to be applied to the field of food, foam, and actuator production. The work on food production focuses on processes and additives which allow grains and proteins to be shape stable through traditional cooking processes. It also expands upon how to develop a parametric design space for a food item allowing its nutritional content to be customized. The work on foam production studies how viscous thread instability can be induced in a direct write system to produce complex foamed structures implicitly through the pathing processes. This is a new and distinct method of producing foam objects which allows DW systems to product foams on a smaller scale than traditional explicit design methods. It also allows for the production of structures with a highly tunable elastic modulus. This property was used to develop a needle injection simulator. The work on the production of actuators lead to the development of a novel class of actuator. Electrically Active Hydraulic Solids (EAHS) are a combination of conductive elements, phase change material and elastomer which can be shaped using direct write, injection molding, and cutting techniques. These new actuators self-heat using electrical current and can generate high forces