A Comprehensive Review of Wheat Noodles Science and Technology

Wheat noodles are widely consumed staple foods, but their quality, shelf life, and sustainability remain strongly dependent on controlling interactions among ingredients and processing conditions. This review synthesizes recent scientific advances in wheat noodle production, highlights key mechanisms governing structure formation, quality improvement, preservation, and emerging manufacturing strategies. Noodle quality is primarily determined by the established three-dimensional gluten-starch network. Mechanical sheeting promotes gluten alignment and disulfide cross-linking, thereby producing a dense structure that improves firmness, elasticity, and cooking stability. Alkaline salts further enhance protein interactions while generating yellow color, whereas phosphate salts strengthen gluten-starch cohesion, reduce cooking loss, and suppress enzymatic browning through metal-ion sequestration. Integrated preservation approaches by combining acid treatments, natural antimicrobials, and active packaging technologies have demonstrated substantial extensions of shelf life in fresh noodles. The review also highlights digitalization as a major direction for the industry. The incorporation of artificial intelligence, data-driven and sensor-based monitoring systems could enable real-time process monitoring and adaptive control of raw-material variability. Meanwhile, the incorporation of millets, plant proteins, dietary fibers, and agro-industrial by-products offers opportunities to enhance nutritional value, although their levels must be optimized to avoid compromising gluten development and sensory properties. Overall, future wheat noodle manufacturing will depend on mechanistic understanding, advanced preservation, digital process control, and sustainable ingredient utilization to achieve consistent quality, improved nutritional value, and environmental sustainability.