Article Highlights

• Mass transfer kinetics during osmotic dehydration process of pears in sucrose solution was studied • Peleg model was applied to the experimental data to describe sorption kinetics curves • The equilibrium values for moisture and solid content were estimated using Peleg equation • Peleg rate constants for WL and SG at all temperatures followed an Arrhenius type relationship The applicability of Peleg model was investigated for predicting mass transfer kinetics during the osmotic dehydration (OD) process of pears, at different concentrations (40, 60 and 70%, w/w) and temperatures (20, 35 and 50 °C) of sucrose solution. Increase in sucrose solution concentration resulted in higher water loss (WL) and solid gain (SG) values through the osmotic treatment period. After 360 min of osmotic treatment of pears, WL ranged from 23.71 to 31.68 % at 20 °C, from 24.80 to 40.38 % at 35 °C and from 33.30 to 52.07 % a