Characterization of engineering properties and modeling mass and fruit fraction of wood apple (Limonia acidissima) fruit for post-harvest processing

Abstract

The wood apple ( Limonia acidissima ) fruit is an underutilized fruit having extensive therapeutic and functional properties. The engineering properties (physical, frictional, thermal, textural, and mechanical) of the wood apple fruit aids in the assessment of the internal and external structure of the fruit. The mean principle dimensions of fruit are 7.79 cm, 7.60 cm, and 7.44 cm for longest dimension, intermediate dimension and short dimension axes, respectively whereas the mass of fruit ranges from 169 to 308.8 g. The wood apple fruit has similar average geometric and equivalent diameters i.e., 7.613 cm while fruit is considered to be spherical-shaped fruit having sphericity (0.97). The fruit has less coefficient of friction on galvanized steel (0.17) and angle of repose is measured to be 55.16. The mechanical compression test revealed that less rupture force (472.86 N) is required to break the fruit towards SD orientation at freezing treatment while in textural properties, less force (5.9 KN) is required to rupture the pulp. The differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) thermal properties observed glass transition temperature T g at 88.10 °C. The mass and fruit fraction regression models are developed by correlating physical properties with respective mass by using Linear, Quadratic, power, and S curve models for mass-based grading of fruits and value-added products development in industries as it is effective, convenient, and time-saving than size-grading and indirect methods. The quadratic model is resulted to be most suitable regression model having a greater R 2 value to establish correlation. This research work on engineering properties conveys a broad area of information on wood apple fruit that can be positively recommended for design of processing equipment, storage structures, thermal processers, graders etc., and product development, beneficial to promote commercialization.