Modeling microwave heating of apple cylinders using hybrid mixture theory based transport equations coupled with Maxwell's laws of electromagnetism

To develop an efficient microwave drying scheme for apple cylinders, a multiscale mathematical model was developed to predict the moisture and temperature profiles. Two-scale hybrid mixture theory (HMT) based transport equations were utilized to describe the fluid (water & gas phases) transport during the microwave drying of apple cylinders. Maxwell’s electromagnetic equations were coupled with HMT based transport equations to obtain heating source for evaporative moisture loss in the food matrix. A commercial finite element package (COMSOL Multiphysics ver 4.4) was employed to solve these equations in order to obtain the spatial and temporal profiles for moisture and temperature within the sample. The validation experiments were conducted with a domestic microwave oven. The comparison of the moisture profiles obtained through simulations and experiments resulted in an average absolute difference value of 37.9%. For comparison of experimental and predicted temperature values a parametric sweep was performed. The developed model could be employed efficiently for the prediction of the moisture distribution. The temperature change trend could also be predicted using the developed model.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Food Science & Human Nutrition

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2014

Author dc:creator

• Deng, Jie

Contributors dc:contributor

• Takhar, Pawan

• Microwave Drying
• Hybrid Mixture Theory
• Apple Cylinders

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2014 Jie Deng

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/50663

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/50663