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An alternative strategy for corn drying ( Zea mays ) resulted in both energy savings and reduction of fumonisins B 1 and B 2 contamination
Author(s) -
Yılmaz Neşe,
Tuncel Necati Barış
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
international journal of food science and technology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.831
H-Index - 96
eISSN - 1365-2621
pISSN - 0950-5423
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2621.2009.02175.x
Subject(s) - moisture , contamination , water content , environmental science , energy consumption , pulp and paper industry , agronomy , chemistry , biology , ecology , geotechnical engineering , organic chemistry , engineering
Summary The objectives of this study were to investigate the effect of harvest date on fumonisins contamination and to offer an alternative drying procedure with low energy costs. Corn kernel samples above 13% moisture content were dried with hot air (HA), the technique more usually utilised by farmers and compared with infrared and infrared–hot air (IR–HA) combination techniques. The effect of harvest date on fumonisin contamination was found to be significant while drying had no influence. Due to the fact that the corn remains in the field longer than necessary for economic reasons, energy expenses of the drying techniques were calculated in terms of specific energy consumption for unit of evaporated water. It was found that the energy expenses to reduce the moisture level from 15 to 13% with HA drying were higher than the expenses to reduce the moisture level from 29 to 13% with IR–HA drying combination.