Abstract
Bocaiuva (Acrocomia aculeata) fruit pulp has high potential for food, pharmaceutical and cosmetic applications and in the biofuel industry, however, the main hindrance for these applications is the availability of pulp in sufficient quantity. The pulp of this fruit is usually supplied by rural communities where the processors use manual pulping, which is not only time-consuming but yields product of low quality. Therefore, the objective of this work was to design, fabricate and evaluate the efficiency of an experimental bench device for pulping bocaiuva fruits. The bench device was designed to be compact and easy to operate, consisting of three units (processing, secondary, and peripheral) with intermittent operation and pulping performed by shearing. The performance evaluation of the machine was carried out with fruit dehydrated at 70 ºC and different times of dehydration (6, 12 and 24 hours). The pulp weight was evaluated every 15 seconds during the pulping process period (150 seconds). The highest pulping efficiency (96%) was obtained with fruits that were dehydrated for 24 hours, with a 120-second pulping, which resulted in a production rate of 5.5 kg h-1 This high efficiency makes this mechanized prototype effective for pulping bocaiuva fruits and, thus, it can replace manual pulping, especially in rural communities involved with the bocaiuva production chain.
Highlights
Native fruits of brazilian biome entitled Cerrado are a source of income for many families, contribute to biodiversity conservation and are related to cultural richness
The highest amount of pulp extracted was observed in treatment 3 (T3) and the lowest in treatment 1 (T1), but the results of T1 and treatment 2 (T2) were similar in the final pulp intervals
In the extraction time of 150 seconds, the efficiency (EF150s) of T1 increased to 81.9% and T2 to 93.4%, which were close to the result of T3 (96.0%)
Summary
Native fruits of brazilian biome entitled Cerrado are a source of income for many families, contribute to biodiversity conservation and are related to cultural richness. Specific devices for fruit processing, related to a sustainable extraction, for small farmer cooperatives are scarce. Bocaiuva (Acrocomia aculeata) is one of the most abundant native fruits of the Cerrado biome, especially in the State of Mato Grosso do Sul (MS), Brazil. This fruit has spherical shape and consists of epicarp (20%), mesocarp (42%), endocarp (31%) and seed (7%). The edible, sweet-tasting pulp is oleaginous, fibrous, mucilaginous, and strongly adhered to the rigid and dark endocarp, hindering the pulping process (Farias, 2010)
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