Applications of thin layer modelling techniques and advances in drying of agricultural products

Abstract

Drying of agricultural, food and other products is a valuable process used to increase the usefulness of the product during the non-seasonal periods. The need for agricultural and food products is always increasing because of the increase in population. Hence meeting the need in food requirement is a threat and it can be achieved by increasing the cultivation and also by reducing the wastage of crop, fruits, grains, food products, etc. The wastage of products can be avoided by using preservation processes like conventional and hybrid drying technologies. Also optimizing these technologies is very much important to improve the quality of dried products in a lesser time and at lower costs. In this review, various types of drying methods, the technological improvements in this field and the research work performed using solar and other drying processes are presented. The review papers presented related to these research works is summarized. The modelling methods used to analyse and optimize the process parameters are presented. Thin layer modelling equations developed are tabulated and the analysis of drying kinetics and the effectiveness of these models for various products with different drying methods are presented.