Analysis of drying of melon peels using numerical solution of the diffusion equation

摘要

The objective of this work was to apply a diffusive model to describe the drying ofmelon peels and use them to analyze the process for various operating conditions.For this, a numerical solution was developed considering shrinkage and diffusivity asa function of the local moisture content. This solution was obtained considering aboundary condition of the third kind. In the present work, drying of melon peels wascarried out in an oven (with and without osmotic pretreatment) at temperatures of60 and 70℃. The osmotic pretreatments were carried out in binary solutions(sucrose and distilled water) with 20° Brix at a ratio of 1:3 (g/g) (peel to solution).According to the statistical indicators obtained, the model proposed adequately fittedto the experimental data, providing values for the chi-square and the coefficient ofdetermination of 7.682 × 10~(-4) to 2.356 × 10~(-3) and .99953–.99982, respectively.Both pretreatment and temperature influenced the drying parameters of the process.