| Summary: | Empirical modeling of the effects of magnetic field
pretreatment on the drying rate of sweet pepper and fluted pumpkin leaf was
done. Static, pulse and alternating magnetic fields were used in conjunction
with magnetic field strength (5 - 30 mT) and pretreatment time (5 - 25 min)
as the combined pretreatment factors. All samples were dried at 50 °C after
pretreatment and the drying rate was estimated. Data obtained were used to
produce bar charts that showed statistical effect of magnetic field
pretreatment on the drying rate. Same set of data were also used to develop
empirical model equations. Results showed that most of the magnetic field
pretreatment combinations caused the drying rate of SP (20 - 21 g·h-1) and
FPL (10 - 12.50 g·h-1) to be significantly higher than the drying rate of
blanched samples of SP (17 g·h-1) and FPL (8 g·h-1) at P ≤ 5%. Also, there
are six (6) empirical model equations that reliably described the
characteristics of the process with R2
(88 - 98 %); R2
adj (83 - 95 %);
coefficients of variation (0.88 - 3.80); standard error (0.11 - 1.07); mean of
residuals (-0.0008 - 0.0002); standard deviation (0.16 - 1.19); probability
values (0.0000 - 0.0007) and adequate precision values (6.80 - 25.46).
|
|---|