فهرست نشریات علمی دسترسی آزاد ایران

Tree tomato fruits are seasonal and highly nutritious; however, a significant portion of the produce is for immediateconsumption owing to their perishability and inadequate preservation methods. To our knowledge, there are nostudies that have been conducted on the drying kinetics of tree tomato pulp. Four different pulp layer thicknesses(2, 4, 6, and 8 mm) were dried using a convective oven at air velocities of 15 m/s, set at temperatures of 40, 50, and60 °C, and then ground into powder. The quality of the powder, drying curves, and the best-fit drying kinetic modelto predict the drying behavior were determined. Drying curves across the different temperatures demonstrated thathigher temperatures accelerated the drying process for all thicknesses. At 60 °C, materials across all thicknessesshowed a rapid reduction in moisture ratio (MR), indicating a faster moisture removal rate. Thicker samples hadnotably higher MRs across all time points than thinner samples, signifying slower drying rates. The inverserelationship between thickness and drying rate was attributed to increased resistance to moisture diffusion in thickerlayers, which slowed the internal water movement to the surface of the materials, decreasing the overall drying rate.Water activity for the dried samples was below 0.6, indicating the product was microbiologically and chemicallystable. There was a significant difference for vitamin C, total phenols, and hygroscopicity across the dryingtemperatures (p < 0.05). Samples dried at a temperature of 60 °C recorded higher total phenols, while thehygroscopicity decreased with an increase in temperature. Lower values of vitamin C were recorded at lower dryingtemperatures.