Pretreatment effect on sun and solar drying of carrot slices

Carrot slices pretreated (water and steam blanching, addition of ascorbic acid) and untreated carrot were dried in the sun and in a solar dryer. The drying time for pretreated carrot slices was shorter than untreated. Four mathematical models were fitted to the experimental data. Results obtained from regression analysis of experimental data shows that the Page model represents drying characteristics better than other models. The effective moisture diffusivity values ranged from 2.91 x 10-10 m2s-1 to 3.74 x 10-10 m 2 s -1 and 3.32 x 10-10 m 2 s -1 to 5.01 x 10-10 m 2 s -1 for samples dried in sun and solar respectively. Keywords: Sun-drying; Solar-drying; Modelling Journal of Applied Science, Engineering and Technology , 7 Volume 10