Study of some properties of doum palm fruit (Hyphaene thebaica Mart.) in relation to moisture content

Abstract

The physical properties of doum palm fruit were determined as a function of moisture content. The average dimension of doum palm fruit in the three principal axes (namely, length, width, and thickness) and its equivalent diameter, projected area, sphericity, porosity, bulk and true densities were determined for moisture contents ranging from 24.05 to 67.59% d.b and were found to be 60.65, 48.78, 47.09 and 51.61 mm, 19.94 cm2 and 0.85 respectively, while the true and bulk densities increased from 711.05 to 958.53 kg/m3 and 370.51 to 483.77 kg/m3 respectively with moisture content but the porosity increased from 46.45 to 51.66% and later decreased to 49.53%. The dimension of doum palm fruit with its equivalent diameter, projected area and sphericity were found to be constant with moisture content variation. It was found that the relationships between true and bulk densities and moisture content of doum palm fruit followed a linear pattern while that of porosity exhibited a non-linear relationship with the moisture content at 0.05 significance level. Key words: Doum palm, bulk density, true density, moisture content and projected area.