Temperature and relative humidity effect on equilibrium moisture content of cassava pulp

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to study the effect of temperature and relative humidity on the equilibrium moisture content of cassava pulp. In experiments, cassava pulp was tested with a static method that controlled the temperature at 30, 50 and 70°C and controlled relative humidity in a range 10-90% with standard saturated salt solutions as LiCl, MgCl2, NaBr, NaCl and KNO3. Five equations of equilibrium moisture isotherm were analysed to predict the equilibrium moisture content, which was a guideline to develop a new isotherm equation. The experimental results showed that the equilibrium moisture content was increased with increased relative humidity whereas it decreased with increased drying temperature. Therefore, the drying process and storage method of cassava pulp must control temperature and relative humidity of no more than 50°C and 60%, respectively. The analysis of isotherm equations revealed that the new isotherm equation has high accuracy to predict the equilibrium moisture content of cassava pulp and higher R2 correlation with the experimental data than five isotherm equations.

Keywords

• agri-product storage
• food processing
• microbiological stability
• isotherm
• tapioca