Modeling the Drying Process of Myrtle Fruits: Analyzing Effective Moisture Diffusivity, Activation Energy, and Expansion Ratio Using Instant Controlled Pressure Drop (DIC)

The process of obtaining plant extracts includes several steps and the quality of an extract is influenced by several factors such as the parts of the aromatic and medicinal plant. The majority of research on plant drying focuses on the impact of the drying process on the chemical composition and antioxidant activity of essential oils and methanolic extracts on leaves, stems, flowers, and fruits. The different parts of the Myrtle (Myrtuscommunis L.) have traditionally various specific applications; fruit decoction is used in the treatment of infectious diseases and skin diseases In the present study, in collaboration with the laboratory for valorization of forest resources, we studied the behavior of myrtle fruits by combining two treatments highly recommended for the drying of aromatic and medicinal plants: a DIC pretreatment on initially fresh fruits followed by controlled convective drying of the temperature and humidity of the drying air, which represents an innovation in drying processes since we have treated the leaves with separate processes in previous research. The application of DIC resulted in an extended product structure, which led to a mathematical modeling of diffusion coefficient as a function of temperature and relative expansion ratio. As a result, the overall drying operation has improved in terms of efficiency, energy consumption and environmental sustainability.