Modeling Mechanical Property Changes During Heating of Carrot Tissue - A Microscale Approach

S. Kadam[1], A. K. Datta[1]
[1]Department of Biological & Environmental Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
Published in 2014

Turgor pressure loss and pectin degradation result in texture loss during cooking of plant based materials. To simulate texture loss, a simultaneous heat and moisture transfer, pectin degradation in the cell wall material and solid mechanical model was developed at the microscale using finite elements to predict the homogenized Young’s Modulus of the carrot tissue during heating. The model developed was validated by comparing Young’s Modulus history and good agreement was found between experimental data and predicted values. The developed framework can be used to simulate texture changes during cooking root vegetables.

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