ANALYSIS OF MOISTURE PROFILES, MASS BLOT NUMBER AND DRIVING FORCES DURING DRYING OF POTATO SLABS

The drying of shrinking bodies is analysed by numerically solving a dr ying model in order to obtain a deeper insight into the drying pl oc e ss, calculating moisture pr profiles and various forms of Blot number. Moisture profiles shows great differences when different units of con centration are used. Calculated Blot numbers do nor satisfactorily exp lain the drying kinetic curves for solids with a high initial moisture content because the equilibrium curve is not a straight line. Kinetic s drying curves are satisfactorily analysed in terms of variation of t otal driving force with time, which differs markedly from the correspo nding variation of the total driving force in terms of temperature, fb r a pure heat transfer process (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Limited. All rights reserved.