Underutilized kadam (Neolamarckia cadamba) fruit: Determination of some engineering properties and drying kinetics

Abstract

Abstract This study aimed to determine the engineering properties of Kadam fruits which will help to develop the post-harvest technologies for it. In physical properties the dimensions, arithmetic mean diameter, geometric mean diameter, surface area, sphericity (104.68), porosity (52.72), true density (1.04), bulk density (0.49) and color of Kadam fruits was measured. The thermal properties like specific heat (3.83), thermal conductivity (0.593), thermal diffusivity (0.1401) and latent heat of (1698.45) were estimated. The outer color of fruit in terms of l*, a*, b* values were as 41.94, −2.25 and 29.18 respectively which suggests the color of fruit as green. The drying kinetics was studied at 50 °C to 110 °C and modeling of thin-layer infrared drying of Kadam fruit pulp was planned by using regression analysis. The final color of Kadam pulp powder at each drying temperature was measured to find the effect of drying temperature on the color. In browning kinetics, the change in color of fresh-cut Kadam fruit due to enzymatic browning was measured by using color coordinates.