Study of Mechanical Deformations on Tough Skinned Vegetables during Mechanical Peeling Process (A Review)

Peeling is an essential phase of post harvestingand processing industry; however undesirable processing lossesare unavoidable and always have been the main concern of foodprocessing sector. There are three methods of peeling fruits andvegetables including mechanical, chemical and thermal,depending on the class and type of fruit. By comparison, themechanical methods are the most preferred; mechanical peelingmethods do not create any harmful effects on the tissue and theykeep edible portions of produce fresh. The main disadvantage ofmechanical peeling is the rate of material loss and deformations.Obviously reducing material losses and increasing the quality ofthe process has a direct effect on the whole efficiency of foodprocessing industry, this needs more study on technologicalaspects of these operations. In order to enhance the effectivenessof food industrial practices it is essential to have a clearunderstanding of material properties and behaviour of tissuesunder industrial processes. This paper presents the scheme ofresearch that seeks to examine tissue damage of tough skinnedvegetables under mechanical peeling process by developing anovel FE model of the process using explicit dynamic finiteelement analysis approach. A computer model of mechanicalpeeling process will be developed in this study to stimulate theenergy consumption and stress strain interactions of cutter andtissue. The available Finite Element softwares and methods willbe applied to establish the model. Improving the knowledge ofinteractions and involves variables in food operation particularlyin peeling process is the main objectives of the proposed study.Understanding of these interrelationships will help researchersand designer of food processing equipments to develop new andmore efficient technologies. Presented work intends to reviewavailable literature and previous works has been done in thisarea of research and identify current gap in modelling andsimulation of food processe