EFFECT OF MOISTURE DIFFUSIVITY ON THE PREDICTION OF DRYING BEHAVIOUR OF SPHERICAL FOODSTUFFS IN A FLUIDIZED BED DRYER

In order to understand how effective diffusivity affects moisture profile inside a spherical foodstuff during fluidized bed drying, a mathematical model was proposed and numerically solved. Moisture profile inside the drying material was predicted by considering effective diffusivity as a function of temperature and moisture inside the sample. Results compared with the experimental data. Also the model was solved by considering constant effective diffusivity for prediction of the variation of moisture profile during drying. Comparison of experimental and numerical data showed a good agreement between experimental results and the predictions of the model with variant effective diffusivity coefficient.