Simulation of Microencapsulation Avocado Seeds Oil by Spray Drying

Abstract

Drying air inlet temperature is one of the critical variables in the microencapsulation process by spray drying. However, when spray drying is carried out at inappropriate drying air inlet temperature, it can impact the particle produced. This study presents a simulation of spray drying from a mathematical model was developed to determine the effect of drying air inlet temperature on moisture content, particle diameter, particle density, and drying air outlet temperature in the microencapsulation process of avocado seeds oil as core materials and gum arabic as wall materials. For this aim, the mathematical model was developed then simulated using a matrix laboratory (Matlab) computer program with Euler numerical method for drying air inlet temperatures of 160, 180, and 200 °C. The selected model was validated with Cotabarren’s experimental results indicating the model was acceptable. The particles’ moisture contents predicted from simulation results are 1.170, 1.049, and 0.933 kg water/kg solid for 160, 180, and 200 °C, respectively. On the other hand, the predicted particle diameters are 29.73, 29.49, and 29.23 urn for 160, 180, and 200 °C, respectively. The predicted particle densities are 1215.72, 1225.21, and 1233.25 kg/m3 for 160, 180, and 200 °C, respectively. The prediction of drying air outlet temperatures was 39.76, 41.94, and 43.89 °C for inlet air temperatures of 160, 180, and 200 °C, respectively. The proposed models’ simulation results show that the higher temperatures caused lower particle moisture content, smaller particle diameter, and higher particle density. Also, the outlet drying air temperatures were always the same as the outlet particle temperatures.