Determinação da difusividade térmica e descrição da transferência de calor durante o processo de pasteurização da polpa do coco verde.

Abstract

Brazil is a country recognized for having as its economic base the primary sector, that is, activities that extract or modify raw materials, and among them is agriculture. Coconut cultivation is widely distributed throughout Brazil, more precisely along the coast of the country. Part of the production is destined to the consumption of coconut water, production of copra (dry coconut pulp) and its derivatives. However, the coconut water industry, after extracting its raw material, discards together with the bark the flesh of the immature fruit, which is high in moisture, rich in fibers and minerals. This work proposes a solution for one of the rejects of the agroindustry of the green coconut, which is the green coconut pulp, through the pasteurization of this material, allowing the commercialization with guarantee of food safety. The thermal diffusivity will be determined, allowing the study of heat transfer in the green coconut pulp during the pasteurization process. Pasteurization is a food preservation process that uses heat to inactivate pathogenic microorganisms, making it possible to prolong the shelf life of products. Thus, a larger consumer market can be achieved by enabling it to be transported to the most distant consumer centers, among other advantages. A numerical solution will be presented for the diffusion equation with boundary condition of the first variable type. A mathematical modeling will be developed for the solution of a direct heat diffusion problem in an interior of a parallelepiped container containing the green coconut pulp. A software with suc modeling will be used not only to determine the thermal diffusivity of the product from experimental kinetic heating data, but also to simulate kinetics for containers with other dimensions.