Experimental analysis and mathematical modelling of ginger using different solar drying systems

Abstract

Fruits and vegetables are perishable; they don’t have shelf life. They contain so much water that their logistic become difficult. Drying is both heat and mass exchange energy activity, mainly utilized as a food preservation technique. Fresh collected ginger was effectively dried from starting moisture content of 86% (w.b.) to the safe storage moisture content of 13% - 14% (w.b.) in open sun drying (OSD) and hot air oven solar dryers. It was found that hot air dryer of glass to glass module took less time (8hrs as compared to hot air dryer of opaque module (10hrs) and open sun drying (OSD) (14hrs). Drying behavior of ginger slices was analyzed during various mathematical models. Page model explains the drying behavior of ginger precisely with maximum values of coefficient of determination (R²) i.e. 0.996, 0.997 and 0.994 for hot air dryer of glass to glass module, opaque module and OSD respectively, and this model has minimum reduced chi-square, mean bias error and root mean square error.