Modeling of Drying Kinetics of Chestnuts

• Author(s): Correia, Paula ; Andrade, Sónia ; Guiné, Raquel
• Date: 2013
• Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.19/1766
• Origin: Repositório Científico do Instituto Politécnico de Viseu
• Subject(s): drying; chestnut; kinetic model; moisture ratio
• Document Type: Conference Object
• Language: English

Description

Chestnuts (Castanea Sativa) are produced in Portugal in considerable amounts, thus providing an important economic trade. Furthermore, apart from being eaten in their natural state, they can be used for a multiplicity of industrial applications, either in their natural form or after dehydration. In this work the drying kinetics of different cultivars of chestnuts was investigated, and the experiments were carried out under isothermal conditions, using a convective drier set to a temperature of 60 ºC. The experimental data obtained for the variations of moisture content along drying was fit to three thin layer models from literature with success. The experimental drying rate points were expressed as moisture ratio versus time. The results obtained allowed concluding that some chestnuts had higher initial moisture content than others and also that the presence or absence of the peel did not influence the initial moisture content of the chestnuts from the different cultivars tested. Regarding the drying curves observed for the cultivars tested, they show some differences. As to the mathematical modeling of the drying kinetics, the three models used show different performances, being the Vega-Lemus model slightly less adequate to fit the experimental sets of points.