The world record for the thinnest pasta has been shattered, though the new, narrow noodles are better suited to wound dressings than the dinner table.
From white flour, researchers made starch-rich nanofibers that are about 370 nanometers thick, on average — or about two hundredths the thickness of a human hair. The nano-noodles could be used in biodegradable bandages, chemist Adam Clancy and colleagues reported October 30 in Nanoscale Advances.
To make the noodle “dough,” the scientists mixed the flour with formic acid, a liquid that helps uncoil the long starch molecules in the flour. “Normally, if you want to cook starch, then you use water and heat to break up the tight packing of starch,” says Clancy, of University College London. “We do that chemically with formic acid. So we effectively pickle it instead of cooking it.”
The researchers carefully warmed the dough to give it the right consistency. Then, via a technique called electrospinning, they used an electric charge to pull the mixture through a needle and onto a plate a few centimeters away (SN: 4/4/06). The starch molecules tangle with each other as they leave the needle, forming a continuous jet. As the jet flies through the air, the formic acid evaporates, leaving a thin fiber behind. After about 30 seconds, the fiber forms a thin mat on the plate.
Mats made from starchy nanofibers typically have pores that are large enough to let water molecules through but too small for bacteria to enter, making them attractive options for bandages and wound dressings. Previous research has made electrospun mats from pure starch, but the process of extracting that starch from plant matter is energy- and water-intensive. The new study shows that the extraction isn’t strictly necessary.
“If you use it for bandages, it doesn’t really matter that there’s cellulose and protein there,” Clancy says.
Since the fibers are made of dried flour, they can be classified as pasta. That makes them the thinnest pasta on record — roughly a thousandth the width of su filindeu, a type of pasta about half the width of angel hair noodles that’s exclusively handmade by just one family in the town of Nuoro, Italy.
But is Clancy’s nanopasta edible? “I certainly hope so,” he says.