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Spinoff story
Freeze-Dried Foods Nourish Adventurers and the Imagination
A real-world story of NASA technology finding a life beyond the mission.
About this technology
Overview
Freeze-dried food is commonplace today, thanks in part to NASA, which helped innovate many of the modern techniques during early research into food preservation for space exploration. In particular, NASA’s advances made freeze-dried meals easier to rehydrate without boiling water. Capitalizing on the interest in astronauts in the early 1970s, the gift shop at Ames Research Center reached out to Boulder-based American Outdoor Products, already using NASA’s improved techniques for its freeze-dried foods, and asked them to create “astronaut ice cream.” The company now sells it around the world.