Evolution of the porous structure of cocoa beans during microwave drying

Abstract

In this work, it was evaluated the morphological changes of the porous structure of the cocoa bean samples subjected to microwave drying. The use of microwaves (MWs) applied by ON-OFF on cocoa bean samples allowed to avoid both the burning and the roasting of the beans. During the MWs drying process, phenomena of breakage of cellular structure, coalescence and, pore plugging altered the average pore diameter, the pore volume, surface area, and Pore Size Distribution (PSD). When the results of sun-dried beans were compared with those of beans dried by MWs, it was concluded that the average pore diameter, the pore volume, the surface area and, PSD were also affected by the solar drying; however, the breakage of cellular structure did not occur.

Keywords:

• Drying
• cocoa beans
• porous structure
• coalescence of pores
• blockage of pores

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The authors are thankful with the Colciencias PhD scholarship program (number: 617 and 528), Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Universidad de La Guajira and the project “Strategy of transformation of the Colombian energy sector in the horizon 2030” funded by the call 788 of Colciencias Scientific Ecosystem (Contract number FP44842-210-2018 of Colciencias).