APLICATION OF SAFES METHODOLOGY TO THE OSMOTIC DEHYDRATION OF KIWI (ACTINIDIADELICIOSA VAR. HAYWARD)

Kiwi is an important fruit in the diet because contains vitamins, antioxidants and ions, fundamentals in an equilibrated meal. Self life of this fruit is short and requires conservation techniques to enhance it commercial life. In this sense, modern techniques to analyze how change the product (as SAFES) and how change through the treatment, allow as to develop a new product with the specific characteristics what are looking for. SAFES methodology (Systematic approach in food engineering systems) is a technique to describe the structure of food through any treatment which provides the physicochemical transitions, chemical and biochemical reactions and energy and mass transports. The aim of this work is to explain how change the structure of kiwi through the osmotic dehydration with 61,5% (w/v) sucrose solution at 45ºC, at short times from 0 to 300 minutes. Since the short times of dehydration applied did not allow the equilibration of the system and there were continuous changes of parameters, only one Matrix of changes was indentified. Considering the kiwifruit as a biological system compost of cells, pores and intercellular spaces, two types of tissue (vascular and parenchymatic) were individuated on the basis of cell characteristics that can influence the transport. Moreover the different phases as solid matrix and liquid phase were found in both tissues. One of the main ingredients of kiwifruit is water and its distribution was studied by SAFES application. The water sorption isotherm (Moraga et al., 2006) was used to characterize the adsorbed water in solid matrix, while the sharing out of the liquid water in vascular and parenchymatic tissues was performed by the external volume evaluation.