Just as I was getting a handle on how different kinds of pasta are extruded, the self-described "most reputable company in the global Italian meal experience" up-ends it all with digitally manufactured pasta. Barilla has just announced the winners of their "Print Eat" 3D-printed pasta design challenge, which prompted entrants to design pasta shapes that couldn't be made the traditional way.

The number of submissions was so overwhelming--more than 530 product designers from 20 countries around the world jumped in, submitting some 216 concepts--that the judges required time extensions. (The contest wrapped in October, and the results were just announced yesterday.) Here are the three winners:

Rosa Pasta from Loris Tupin, a French industrial designer from Maxilly sur Leman, is a 'bio-dynamic' 3D model that 'blooms' to turn into a rose when placed in boiling water.

Vortipa by Danilo Spiga and Luis Fraguarda, a product design team from Cagliari, Italy. Their pasta was based on the vortex pattern progression system and it looks a bit like a Christmas tree.

Lune, by Alessandro Carabini, an Italian product designer who works in collaborative Studio Abaco in Paris, France, submitted a full moon with craters, and he says it will "improve the interaction between pasta and sauces."

"We were thrilled to see the enthusiasm with which the contest was greeted by the designer community, which is not used to dealing with food," said Michela Petronio, Research Vice President at the Barilla Group, before hedging a bit on whether any of these designs will make it to store shelves: "There are several steps that must be taken on the 3D project - but whatever the future of pasta, Barilla is going to be there."

Via 3DPrint.com and ThinGarage