Moisture Loss Kinetics of Apple During Convective Hot Air and Isothermal Drying

Abstract

Effective moisture diffusivity of cylindrical apple samples (0.7 and 1.4 cm diameter) was determined under convective hot air drying (40, 50, 60, and 70° C and 1.5 and 3 m/s air velocity). The effective moisture diffusivities obtained were in the range of reported values and were found to be temperature dependent according to the Arrhenius relationship. However, the prediction of moisture loss obtained from Fick's diffusion model failed to follow experimental drying curves. Temperature profiles during convective hot air drying showed temperature gradients. This lack of isothermal conditions may lead to inaccurate predictions of moisture loss. Therefore, a combined microwave-convective hot air apparatus, capable of providing isothermal drying conditions, was used to quantify the drying kinetics. Differences in effective diffusivities determined from convective (9.6–18.5 3 10210 m2/s) and isothermal (20.3–37.6 3 10210 m2/s) drying experiments were shown. Using effective diffusivities obtained under isothermal conditions, the Fickian model still did not predict moisture loss during isothermal drying. Due to the developing porous structure of apple during drying, it was hypothesized that drying of a hygroscopic porous material is limited by evaporation of water to water vapor. Therefore, an irreversible first-order kinetic model was proposed to predict isothermal drying of apple. Using the rate constant calculated from the slope of the normalized drying curves (0.08–0.17 min21), the model predicted accurate moisture loss at each temperature throughout the entire moisture range of 0.06–8.5 g/g dry solid.