Papers by Author: Luis Mayor

Abstract: Osmotic dehydration of pumpkin (Cucurbita pepo, L.) fruits was carried out with binary solutions of sucrose and NaCl at different temperatures and solute concentrations. Water loss and solids gain kinetics were experimentally determined and fitted using a diffusional model. Pumpkins samples were considered as finite cylinders and the analytical solution of the unsteady diffusion equation was used considering the external resistance to the mass transfer negligible. The influence of shrinkage and temperature on the effective diffusion coefficients was also assessed in this work.

Abstract: Chesnut and pumpkin fruits were dehydrated with osmotic solutions of sucrose and NaCl at 25°C. These food materials have different structure, composition and porosity. Water loss and solids gain kinetics were experimentally determined and modeled using a diffusional model. In spite of the several mass transfer mechanisms taking place along with diffusion during osmotic dehydration, the modeling was satisfactory and involved effective coefficients of diffusion useful to quantify the different mass transfer fluxes. Water and sucrose transfer rates during osmotic dehydration with sucrose solutions are independent on the initial food material characteristics; however they seem to be related with the permeability of these components to a sucrose layer formed in the surface of the samples. In the case of osmotic dehydration with sodium chloride solutions, the coefficients of diffusion show a dependence on food material characteristic and higher values of these coefficients for pumpkin (more porous material) were found.

Abstract: Osmotic dehydration experiments of pumpkin with binary aqueous solutions of sucrose, sodium chloride and ternary solutions with both solutes at 298 K were carried out. Weight reduction, water loss and solute acquisition kinetics were determined. Experimental data were fitted employing a diffusional model considering samples as spheres and the external resistance to the mass transfer negligible. The model gave as parameter of fitting an effective diffusion coefficient for each component transferred (water, sucrose and sodium chloride) for each experimental condition assayed. Correlations between the effective diffusivity and solute concentration were established for binary and ternary systems.