Scientists beat chefs to the skinniest spaghetti

Their lab-created ‘nanopasta’ is said to measure just 372 nanometres in width – narrower than some wavelengths of light and a fraction of the thickness achieved by legendary chef Paola Abraini’s famously thin variant.

Abraini’s recipe, mastered only by two of her close female relatives in the town of Nuoro in Sardinia, is titled su filindeau (‘Threads of God’). Estimates of its thickness vary but can be less than 1 millimetre and efforts to replicate it manually, including by chef Jamie Oliver, have so far failed.

However, laboratory science has succeeded where culinary nous has fallen short, thanks to the use of electrospinning techniques. These involve liquid and flour threads being taken through the eye of a needle, using electric charge, to strike the mixture at a metal plate; with the plate and needle in effect functioning as a battery.

Researcher Beatrice Britton undertook the study for her chemistry master’s at UCL, replicating the standard method for making spaghetti, explained UCL chemistry department’s Dr Adam Clancy, who co-authored the paper published in Nanoscale Advances. 

He commented: “To make spaghetti, you push a mixture of water and flour through metal holes. In our study, we did the same except we pulled our flour mixture through with an electrical charge. It’s literally spaghetti but much smaller.”

While the novel pasta threads can be viewed collectively as part of a 2 cm wide nonofibre mat, the individual threads were invisible to the naked eye and too indistinct even for visible light cameras or microscopes. A scanning electron microscope was required to measure them.

Abraini’s status as premier pasta maker is unlikely, however, to be challenged by her spaghetti’s even more svelte new competitor, admitted Clancy’s co-author, professor Gareth Williams of UCL pharmacy school.

He said: “I don’t think it’s useful as pasta, sadly, as it would overcook in less than a second, before you could take it out of the pan.”

Coupled with that, the nanopasta is not made with the traditional mix of flour and water but relies on formic acid for its liquid component. While formic acid has its uses in foodstuffs as a preservative and to counter acidity, it is unlikely to gain approval as a primary ingredient.

However, where it fails in the kitchen, the invention could prove potentially useful in medical science and industry. 

Starch nanofibres can be extracted from plant cells but the purification process remains energy and resource intensive. Creating the fibres from flour starch offers a more sustainable alternative, explained Clancy as it is abundant, renewable and biodegradable, as well as being the second largest biomass source after cellulose.

Added Williams: “Nanofibres, such as those made of starch, show potential for use in wound dressings as they are very porous. In addition, [they] are being explored for use as a scaffold to regrow tissue, as they mimic the extra-cellular matrix – a network of proteins and other molecules that cells build to support themselves.” 

Pics: Beatrice Britton/Adam Clancy