Phase equilibrium thermodynamics for the improvement of physical properties of food bioproducts and their prediction in industrial and digestive processes

Abstract

Simulating food processes by using commercial softwares is still a great challenge. This is due to the low comprehension, presented in literature, on the thermodynamic behavior of the solid phase of food mixtures, as well as on the complexity, and the high number of their intra- and intermolecular interactions, responsible for the increase in the deviation of an ideal behavior. This fact is marked by the lack of experimental data of physical properties in the international databanks. Despite such a demand, there are few research groups in the world working at modeling and prediction of the thermodynamic behavior of physical properties of food systems, which is important for processes and simulation. Thus, focusing on systems of interest for fat and oil industry (lipids, biopharmaceuticals and biodiesel) due to its relevance, this project is aimed at: i) experimental determination of physical properties of food biocompounds and the solid-liquid equilibrium of their mixtures; ii) development of predictive models for modeling the solid-liquid equilibrium of lipidic systems and biopharmaceuticals; iii) and for modeling of pure biocompounds physical properties; iv) simulation of crystallization processes of systems of interest for fat and oils and pharmaceutical industries; v) simulation of the thermodynamic behavior of lipidic mixtures during digestive processes. The results will be applied on the: i) prediction of solid fraction curves of food fat and oils; ii) formulation of blends of biodiesel from vegetable oils, with better cold properties; iii) comprehension of the physicochemical behavior, during digestion, of biopharmaceutical mixtures used for reduction of cholesterol from human body; Also, the project is aimed at the consolidation of a research line on "Physical properties and food processes simulation" in the Home-Institution, with a close collaboration with the other research lines on food science, technology and engineering. (AU)