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Hybrid drying of pulped arabica coffee cherry beans ( Coffea arabica L. cv. Catuai ) using a hexagonal microwave dryer designed by numerical simulations
Author(s) -
Costa Felipe Orlando,
Alvarenga Thatielle Ferreira,
Mesquita Thamara Vieira Correia,
Petri Júnior Irineu
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
journal of food process engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.507
H-Index - 45
eISSN - 1745-4530
pISSN - 0145-8876
DOI - 10.1111/jfpe.13666
Subject(s) - microwave , moisture , coffea arabica , grain drying , hexagonal crystal system , process engineering , water content , materials science , physics , chemistry , engineering , horticulture , composite material , biology , geotechnical engineering , quantum mechanics , crystallography
The consumption of specialty coffees has been increasing significantly in recent years. Their quality is influenced by several factors and the drying method is the most important. In order to reduce drying time and maintain the quality of the coffee, several techniques have been used, among which the microwave‐assisted convective drying stands out. In this work, a hexagonal microwave dryer was developed using numerical simulation techniques; then some parameters were evaluated in drying of special coffee using air at room temperature and microwaves heating, named hybrid drying. The results showed that the simulations reaches good results, being possible its use in the prediction of the electromagnetic fields and dimensioning of hexagonal cavities. In addition, the prototype performed well in the coffee drying, influenced by the coffee mass, temperature and time, reducing the moisture content from 50.4 to 10 g/100 g wet basis in 5 hr. The hybrid drying was advantageous compared with convective or microwave drying processes. Practical applications Special coffees require long drying times so that there is no loss of product quality. The application of hybrid drying by including microwave heating in the drying equipment reduces the energy cost and the processing time, providing an improvement in the processing of specialty coffees. Through this work, it was possible to verify the scale‐up potential of the microwave cavities by simulation and the hybrid drying of special coffees. The use of numerical simulation techniques for the design and scale‐up of microwave cavities will help researchers and the industry to dimension cavities for use in several scientific areas, further spreading hybrid drying via microwave.