The ‘robochef’ that can taste the salt in food

A ‘ROBOT chef’ has been trained to taste food during the chewing process to check if it is salty enough – just like humans do.

Cambridge University researchers suggest their results could help in developing automated food preparation by helping robots learn what has a good flavour.

When food is chewed, people notice a change in taste and texture as saliva and enzymes are released.

A probe – which acts like a saltiness sensor – was attached to a robot arm, which then ‘tasted’ variations of tomatoes and scrambled eggs and gave readings at different points of chewing. The mixture was blended to imitate these stages.

This ‘taste as you go’ approach improved the robot’s ability to assess the saltiness of the dish.

Study co-author Dr Arsen Abdulali said: ‘The robot can “see” the difference in the food as it’s chewed, which improves its ability to taste.’

The findings are in the Frontiers in Robotics and AI journal.