Research landscape and trending topics on 3D food printing – a bibliometric review

Abstract

Purpose

Three-dimensional (3D) food printing is an innovative technology used to customize food products through the integration of digital technology and food ingredients. The purpose of this study is to assess the current state of research in the field of 3D food printing, identify trending topics and identify promising future research directions.

Design/methodology/approach

This bibliometric review systematically evaluates the field of 3D food printing using data from published literature in the Web of Science database. After reference screening, 812 articles were included in the analysis.

Findings

The result reveals that research in 3D food printing primarily focuses on the optimization and characterization of mechanical and rheological properties of food inks and that post-printing processing, such as laser treatment, has emerged recently as an important consideration in 3D food printing. However, extant works lack animal and human studies that demonstrate the functionality of 3D-printed food.

Originality/value

This sophisticated bibliometric analysis uncovered the most studied current research topics and the leading figures in the area of 3D food printing, providing promising future research directions.

Citation

Bi, S., Pi, J., Chen, H., Zhou, Y., Liu, R., Chen, Y., Che, Q., Li, W., Gu, J. and Zhang, Y. (2024), "Research landscape and trending topics on 3D food printing – a bibliometric review", Rapid Prototyping Journal, Vol. 30 No. 8, pp. 1693-1706. https://doi.org/10.1108/RPJ-02-2024-0098