Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145

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Renewable Energy
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Mathematical modeling of sun and solar drying of chilli pepper

T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde*
Department of Food Science and Engineering, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, PMB 4000, Ogbomoso, Oyo State, Nigeria

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The drying characteristics for chilli pepper using sun and solar drying were investigated. Chilli pepper
Received 13 June 2010 was pretreated by water and steam blanching and by soaking in osmotic solutions of 60 and 70
brix.
Accepted 13 January 2011 Untreated chilli pepper was taken as a control. The pretreated chilli pepper dried faster than untreated
chilli pepper while the drying of both samples occurred in falling rate period. Four thin-layer drying
models (Newton, Henderson and Pabis, Logarithmic and Page) were tted to the experimental data to
Keywords:
select a suitable drying equation. The Page model was found to best describe the drying behavior of chilli
Sun drying
pepper for sun and solar drying.
Solar drying
Thin-layer drying models
2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Chilli pepper

1. Introduction
Chilli peppers are one of the common vegetables consumed in
Nigeria. They are good sources of vitamins, rich in beta-carotene and
minerals including potassium and may be used as spice and avor in
the dried and milled form [1e3]. Chillies are known to contain high
moisture content (300e400% db) after harvest and are highly
perishable whilst shelf-life of freshly harvested chillies is estimated
to be two e three days based on 12e15% cumulative loss [3].
Fresh chillies are commonly preserved by sun drying after
harvest in many developing nations. However sun drying has some
problems, including contamination and long drying times. In order
to overcome these disadvantages, the drying process can be
replaced with solar drying or industrial drying methods such as hot
air. Research has been done to reduce drying time to improve the
quality of chillies obtained during sun drying [4] and by using
alternate methods i.e. solar drying methods [4,5]; and mechanical
drying [4,6].
Mechanical drying which is mainly used in industrialized coun-
tries as an alternative to sun drying is not applicable to small farms in
Nigeria. This is due to its high investment and operating costs. Solar
drying has been identied as a promising alternative to sun drying
for drying of fruits and vegetables in developing countries like
Nigeria because of its minimal operational cost in terms of fuel cost.
Utilization of solar energy for drying is advantageous because it is
a free, renewable and abundant-energy source beside the environ-
mental friendly and economically viable attributes making it to be
* Tel.: 234 803 666 7935.
E-mail address: toyositunde@yahoo.co.uk.
accepted for use by rural farmers [7]. It is also a more convenient
alternative for rural sector and other areas with scarce or irregular
electricity supply. Studies conducted on solar drying have proved it
is a good alternative for sun drying for the production of high quality
dried products [8e11].
Various methods of pre-treatment which reduce drying time
including blanching and osmotic dehydration have been reported
to have an effect on the drying time of dried food materials [5,12].
Drying results in loss of nutrients and other undesirable phenom-
enon e.g. discoloration and browning for foods [13]. These pretreat-
ments can also be used to reduce the effect of drying on the nutritional
value of the food product [5,14]. Research has been carried out on the
drying kinetics of various food products dried using solar and sun
drying [5,15,16].
The objective of this work is to study the drying characteristics
of chilli pepper by sun and solar drying and to develop a mathe-
matical model for describing the thin-layer drying process for the
sun and solar drying of chilli pepper.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Experimental procedure
Chilli pepper (Capsicum frutescens) of uniform size (average
length, width and thickness of 8e9 cm, 4e5 cm, 2.5e3 cm
respectively) was used. The average initial moisture content of the
peppers was determined using AOAC (1990) methods as 82.5%, wet
basis.
The chili peppers were washed in fresh running water and
divided into ve lots for pre-treatment with the following code
numbers designated:

0960-1481/$ e see front matter 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.renene.2011.01.017
2140 T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde / Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145

Air Inlet
Nomenclature Air Outlet /
Chimney Top cover

a drying constant
b drying constant Glass cover
k drying constant, l/min
L the half-thickness of the samples (m) Solar
Mt moisture content, kg water/kg dry matter Collector
Me equilibrium moisture content, kg water/kg dry
matter Drying
Mo initial moisture content, kg water/kg dry matter Chamber
N number of observations
n drying constant, positive integer
R ideal gas constant, kJ/mol K
R2 coefcient of determination
T temperature,
C Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of a direct solar dryer.

t drying time, min

z number of constants in models
c2 reduced chi-square
 WB: steamed for 5 min, blotted with tissue paper to remove
excess water and then allowed to cool to room temperature
before further processing.
 SB: blanched in boiling water for 3 min, removed from the
boiling water, cooled immediately by placing in a large quantity
of tap water for another 3 min to remove excess heat. It is
drained in a metal sieve and the excess water blotted off before
further processing.
 OSO6: steeped in osmotic solutions prepared using sucrose at
a concentration of 60
brix for 5 h, drained and excess water
was blotted off with tissue paper [9]
 UT: No pre-treatment solution.
 OS70: soaked in osmotic solutions prepared using sucrose at
a concentration of 70
brix for 5 h, drained and excess water
was blotted off with tissue paper [17].
In each experiment, 0.3 kg of fresh red chilli pepper was used.
The drying experiments were carried out during the periods of June
to August 2007 in Ogbomoso, Nigeria. Each test started at 8:00 and
continued till 18:00. For the sun drying process the treated and
untreated whole chilli peppers were dried in the sun by exposing
a single layer of sample in trays placed in the sun. For the solar
drying, the treated and untreated peppers were placed in the trays
in one layer and placed in a solar dryer previously described by
Tunde-Akintunde et al. [18].
The solar dryer used was a direct cabinet type (Fig. 1) which is
used generally for drying agricultural products especially fruits and
vegetables (Reuss, 1993). It consists essentially of a solar collector
placed on top of a drying chamber constructed with plain metal
sheets and wooden frames having a cross-sectional area of
1610 cm2. The dryer base was lined with a reective material with
the trays xed in the drying chamber while the collector unit was
painted black to facilitate absorption of solar radiation. The drying
chamber and the solar collector had the same area. The top cover
was made of glass inclined at an angle of 11
to the horizontal,
which enhances the ow of air from the collector unit through
openings at the top of the drying chamber. The top cover is xed to
the body using hinges and is lifted up in order to place chilli pepper
samples in the solar dryer. The inlet into the dryer is an opening on
the side of the dryer opposite to the location of the air outlet. The
mean temperature in the drying chamber was 45
C. The drier was
installed at a place free of shade, particularly for the period of
drying from 8:00 to 18:00 daily.
Weight loss of the drying chilli peppers was measured at various
time intervals, ranging from 1 h at the beginning of the drying to
two e 3 h during the last stages of the drying process. No
measurement was made during night. A digital weighing balance
(OHAUS Corporation, AR 1530, China) of 150-g capacity (and
0.01 g sensitivity) was used to measure the mass of sample tray.
The drying processes were stopped when the weight loss became
negligible. The experiments were replicated thrice and the average
of the moisture content for each pre-treatment was used for
determining the moisture ratio used for the drying curve.
2.2. Mathematical modeling of drying curves
The Ficks diffusion equation developed for solid objects with
slab geometry reported by Crank [19] was applied to the experi-
mental data. The assumption applied in using this equation was
that there was uniform initial moisture distribution and negligible
external resistance. The equation is as indicated in Eq. (1) below:
!
M  Me 8 p2 Deff t
MR 2 exp (1)
Mo  Me p 4L2
The experimental drying data was graphically analyzed in terms
of reduction in moisture content and moisture ratio with drying
time shown in Eq. (2)>. This is because the moisture ratio curve can
better explain the drying behavior than that of moisture content
curve, as the initial value was one in each of the experiment.
M  Me
MR expkt (2)
Mi  Me
These moisture ratio values were used to predict the drying
model for treated and untreated samples of chilli pepper. The
following models were investigated to describe the drying char-
acteristics of chilli pepper.(Newton model) [8]
MR ekt (3)
(Generalized exponential model) [20] (Henderson and Pabis, 1961)
MR Aekt (4)
(Pages model) ek(t)n [21] (Akpinar and Bicer, 2008)
MR ektn (5)
(Logarithmic model) [22] (Singh et al., 2008)
MR a blnt (6)
 T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde / Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145 2141

1.2

WB 1
1.2 SB
UT

Moisture Ratio
1 0.8 UT
Moisture Ratio
OS70 OS60
0.8
0.6
0.6
0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2
0
0 50 100 0
0 50 100
Drying Time (hrs) Drying Time (hrs)

Fig. 2. Sun drying curves for pretreated and untreated chili pepper.

1.2 1.2
SB
1 1
UT
WB
Moisture ratio

OS60
Moisture ratio
0.8 UT 0.8

0.6 OS70
0.6

0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0
0 50 100 0 50 100
Drying Time (hrs) Drying Time (hrs)

Fig. 3. Solar drying curves for pretreated and untreated chili pepper.

PN  2
These models were tted in the experimental data in their MRexp;i  MRpred;i
i1
linearized form using regression technique. Non-linear regression c2 (7)
analysis was performed using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Nz
Scientists) 11.5.1 software package. The coefcient of determination
N  
R2 was one of the main criteria for selecting the best equation. In 1X
MBE MRpred;i  MRexp;i (8)
addition to the coefcient of determination, the goodness of t was N
i1
determined by various statistical parameters such as reduced chi-
square c2, mean bias error MBE and root mean square error RMSE. " #12
N  2
For quality t, R2 value of the selected model should be highest and 1X
c2, MBE and RMSE values should be lowest [15e18]. The above RMSE MRpred;i  MRexp;i (9)
N i1
parameters were calculated as follows:

3 1.8
Drying rate (g water/g DM.hr)

1.6
2.5
Drying rate (g water/g DM.hr)

WB 1.4
2 UT 1.2
OS70 1
1.5 SB
0.8
UT
1
0.6
OS60
0.4
0.5 0.2
0
0
0 20 40 60 80
0 20 40 60 80
Drying time (hr)
Drying time (hr)

Fig. 4. Drying rate of sun dried pretreated and untreated chili pepper versus drying time.
2142 T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde / Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145

1.4 1.6

Drying rate (g water/g DM.hr)

1.4

Drying rate (g water/g DM.hr)

1.2
SB
WB 1.2
1 UT
UT 1
0.8 OS60
OS70 0.8
0.6 0.6
0.4 0.4
0.2 0.2
0
0
0 50 100
0 50 100
Drying time (hr)
Drying time (hr)

Fig. 5. Drying rate of solar dried pretreated and untreated chili pepper versus drying time.

where MRexp,i and MRpre,i are experimental and predicted moisture
ratios, respectively; N is number of observations; and z is number of
drying constants.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Drying characteristics
The effects of the pre-treatment on changes in the moisture
ratio of chilli pepper with time are shown in Figs. 2 and 3. The shape
of the drying curves for both sun and solar drying is similar to that
obtained for other food materials indicating a rapid moisture
removal from the product at the initial stage, which later decreased
with increase in drying time. Thus the moisture ratio decreased
continually with drying time. This continuous decrease in moisture
ratio indicates that diffusion has governed the internal mass
transfer. This is in agreement with the results of study on gs [14],
lettuce and cauliower leaves [24] and peach slices [25].
The drying time for solar dried samples which varied from 35 to
50 h was lower than that for sun dried samples which varied from

Table 1
Prediction of the model coefcients.

Model Drying temperature Treatment n a k b

Henderson and Pabis Sun WB 1.0321 0.13133
SB 1.0583 0.1353
UT 1.0338 0.0767
OS60 1.040 0.1487
OS70 1.0043 0.1507
Solar WB 1.0464 0.1268
SB 1.0614 0.140
UT 1.04773 0.7232
OS60 1.0859 0.1544
OS70 1.0945 0.1626
Newton Sun WB 0.1264
SB 0.1266
UT 0.0734
OS60 0.1420
OS70 0.1499
Solar WB 0.1201
SB 0.1306
UT 0.068
OS60 0.1406
OS70 0.1470
Logarithmic Sun WB 0.9236 0.2602
SB 0.9422 0.2675
UT 1.0773 0.2681
OS60 0.8804 0.2516
OS70 0.8345 0.2382
Solar WB 0.9571 0.2699
SB 0.9324 0.2664
UT 1.1413 0.2903
OS60 0.9168 0.2648
OS70 0.9031 0.2628
Page Sun WB 1.0911 0.1048
SB 1.1839 0.0871
UT 1.1168 0.05468
OS60 1.11064 0.1145
OS70 1.0042 0.1484
Solar WB 1.1430 0.0889
SB 1.1979 0.0878
UT 1.1894 0.04155
OS60 1.2943 0.08027
OS70 1.3488 0.07683
 T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde / Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145 2143

Table 2
Results of statistical analyses on the modelling of moisture contents and drying time.

Model Drying temperature Treatment R2 c2  103 M B E  102 RMSE

Henderson and Pabis Sun WB 0.9952 0.404 0.1111 0.0193
SB 0.9946 0.52 0.2222 0.0219
UT 0.9977 0.308 0.2593 0.0169
OS60 0.9945 0.536 0.148 0.0223
OS70 0.9982 0.152 0.148 0.0119
Solar WB 0.9948 0.583 0.0124 0.0231
SB 0.994 0.646 0.0103 0.0243
UT 0.9945 0.679 0.0274 0.0249
OS60 0.9876 1.385 0.0042 0.0356
OS70 0.9865 1.479 0.0049 0.0368
Newton Sun WB 0.9942 0.485 0.222 0.0216
SB 0.9914 0.777 0.222 0.0274
UT 0.9964 0.431 0.0741 0.0204
OS60 0.9930 0.619 0.333 0.0244
OS70 0.9982 0.15 0.111 0.0120
Solar WB 0.9927 0.738 0.0467 0.0266
SB 0.9905 0.973 0.129 0.0305
UT 0.9916 1.024 0.0741 0.0313
OS60 0.9813 1.968 0.482 0.0434
OS70 0.9791 2.25 0.425 0.0464
Logarithmic Sun WB 0.9522 8.367 2.692 0.0879
SB 0.9436 9.958 2.769 0.0959
UT 0.9635 3.875 0.1538 0.0598
OS60 0.9360 10.013 2.885 0.0961
OS70 0.9436 8.367 2.615 0.0879
Solar WB 0.95334 5.435 0.691 0.0704
SB 0.9391 6.733 0.7 0.0784
UT 0.9591 4.726 0.053 0.0657
OS60 0.9184 8.916 0.72 0.0902
OS70 0.9066 10.222 0.835 0.0966
Page Sun WB 0.9946 0.383 0.154 0.0188
SB 0.9960 0.317 0.231 0.0171
UT 0.9989 0.142 5.93809E16 0.0114
OS60 0.9935 0.55 0.462 0.0225
OS70 0.9975 0.163 0.115 0.0122
Solar WB 0.9957 0.433 0.125 0.0199
SB 0.9957 0.378 0.265 0.0186
UT 0.9991 0.122 0.338 0.0106
OS60 0.9894 0.001 0.851 0.0309
OS70 0.99003 0.000969 0.922 0.0297

45 to 70 h. This is similar to the results obtained during the drying
of chilli in a solar dryer in which moisture content of red chilli
reduced to 0.05 kg kg1 (db) from 2.85 kg kg1 (db) in 20 h of
drying while it took 32 h to bring down the moisture content of
similar samples to 0.40 kg kg1 (db) by sun drying method [5]. In
another study it was observed that open sun drying of red chilli
took 150 and 102 h compared to a green house type solar drier
which took 90 and 66 h, while a solar cabinet drier took 54 and 36 h
to reduce moisture content from 300% to 9% (db) for unpunched
and punched chillies, respectively [4].
This lower drying time for solar drying of chilli is similar to the
results obtained for drying times of ginger from moisture content of
319 to 11(db)% in solar-biomass hybrid and in only solar operation.
The drying times which were 33 and 72 h, respectively, compared
with that of open sun which was 192 h [26]. Similar trend was also
observed during the drying of turmeric and guduchi under the
same experimental conditions [26].
Pre-treatment of chilli pepper affected the drying time of the
drying process. The pretreated samples dried faster than the
untreated samples, thus conrming the fact that pre-treatment
reduces the resistance to the movement of moisture thereby
increasing the drying rate [5]. The drying of untreated chilli pepper
took about 55 h while pretreated samples had a drying time of
approximately 45 h for reducing the moisture ratio to 0.02. This
indicates that the drying time for chilli at a xed drying air
temperature of 60
C and velocity of 2 m/s can be reduced by 18.18%
by pre-treatment. Comparing the drying times of chilli peppers
(Figs. 2 and 3), for solar drying: Untreated samples (UT) > Water
Blanched samples (WB)/Steam Blanched samples (SB) > Samples
steeped in osmotic solutions of 60 brix (OS60) > Samples steeped
in osmotic solutions of 70 brix (OS70) while for sun drying:
Untreated samples (UT) > Water Blanched samples (WB)/Steam
Blanched samples (SB) > Samples steeped in osmotic solutions of
60 brix (OS60)/Samples steeped in osmotic solutions of 70 brix
(OS70). The effect of pre-treatment was observed to be more
obvious in solar drying. From the data it was apparent that the pre-
treatment promotes faster drying.
The effects of time on drying rates are shown in Figs. 4 and 5 for
sun and solar drying respectively. Drying rate decreased continu-
ously with drying time. This conrms that there is no constant-rate
drying period in these curves with all the drying processes occur-
ring in falling-rate drying period, starting from the beginning of
drying to the end [23,27]. During this period the drying process was
controlled mainly by diffusion mechanisms. This is in agreement
with other reported literature for fruits and vegetables [9,28,29].
3.2. Fitting of drying models
The four drying models (Exponential model e Eq. (4); Newton
model e Eq. (3); Logarithmic model e Eq. (6); and that of Page
model e Eq. (5)) were used to t the drying data obtained in order
to estimate the moisture ratio as a function of drying time. The
drying constants (k) and (b) and coefcients (a) and (n) values
obtained from the models are given in Table 1. The statistical
2144 T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde / Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145

1.2 1.2

1 OS60 (Exp) 1 WB (Exp)

OS70 (Exp) SB (Exp)
OS60 (Pred) 0.8

Moisture Ratio
0.8 UT (Exp)

Moisture Ratio
OS70 (Pred) WB (Pred)
0.6 0.6 SB (Pred)
UT (Pred)
0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0
0 3 6 9 15 23 35 50 65 0 3 6 9 15 23 35 50 65
Drying time (hr) Drying time (hr)

Fig. 6. Experimental and predicted moisture ratio for sun drying of chili pepper.

1.2 1.2

WB (Exp)
OS60 (Exp)
1 1 SB (Exp)
OS70 (Exp)
UT (Exp)
OS60 (Pred)
0.8 0.8 WB (Pred)
OS70 (Pred)
Moisture Ratio

Moisture Ratio
SB (Pred)
UT (Pred)
0.6 0.6

0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0
0 2 4 6 8 10 15 20 25 35 45 55 0 2 4 6 8 10 15 20 25 35 45 55
Drying time (hr) Drying time (hr)

Fig. 7. Experimental and predicted moisture ratio for solar drying of chili pepper.

analyses undertaken on the drying data to evaluate the models for
different experimental conditions (i.e. parameters such as coef-
cient of determination, R2; chi-square, c2; mean bias error, MBE and
root mean square error, RMSE obtained using Eqs. (7e9) are shown
in Table 2. The model that best predicts the drying process will have
higher values of R2, and lower values of c2, MBE and RMSE.
The value of R2 obtained from all the models varied from 0.936
to 0.998 and 0.906 to 0.999 respectively for sun drying and solar
drying, however the R2 values for Page model which varied from
0.993 to 0.998 for sun and 0.989 and 0.999 for solar drying were the
highest. The higher values of R2 for Page model shows that it
represents a better correlation between the moisture ratio and
drying time than the other models. All the models gave better ts
for sun drying than for solar drying. However generally, the R2
values for three of the models (Exponential, Newton and Page)
were greater than 0.970 indicating a good t.
For the sun drying data, the c2 varied from 0.142  103 to
10.013  103 for all the models considered with the lowest value
being that of Page model which was from 0.142  103 to
0.55  103. For the solar drying, c2 obtained or all the models
varied between 0.0009  103 and 10.222  103 thus that of Page
model which was between 0.0009  103 and 0.433  103 was the
lowest. The lowest values for c2 obtained from Page model agrees
with the result obtained from R2 values.
The MBE obtained for all the models varied between
5.93809  1018 and 0.2593  102 for sun drying while that for
solar drying was between 0.0741  102 and 0.922  102. In both
cases the lowest MBE values were from Page model which varied
from 5.93809  1018 to 0.922  102 and 0.125  102 to
0.922  102. The lowest values for MBE which were obtained
from Page model agrees with the other results obtained.
From sun drying data, the RMSE obtained from Exponential
model, Newton model, Logarithmic model and Page model varied
between 0.0199 and 0.233; 0.0120 and 0.0274; 0.0598 and 0.0961;
and 0.0114 and 0.0225 respectively. The RMSE values obtained for
solar drying for the same models varied between 0.0231 and
0.0368; 0.0266 and 0.0464; 0.0657 and 0.0966; and 0.0106 and
0.0309 respectively. The lowest RMSE values for both sun and solar
drying were obtained from Page model. This shows that the models
gave better ts for sun drying than for solar drying since the models
gave lower values for sun drying compared with solar drying.
3.3. Model selection and validation
According to the results of R2, chi-square, MBE and RMSE values
of the thin-layer drying models for all drying conditions, Page model
gave the highest value of R2 and lowest values of other parameters.
This may be due to the fact that the Page model is an empirical
modication and has corrected the shortcomings of other theoret-
ical and semi-theoretical models considered [30]. It can be
concluded that Page model gave the best results than the other
models to describe the drying characteristics of sun and solar drying
of chilli pepper. Thus, this model may be assumed to represent the
sun/solar drying behavior of chilli pepper in thin layers.
Variations of experimental and predicted moisture ratio values
with drying time are given in Figs. 6 and 7 which show the moisture
ratio values predicted by the Page model compared with the
experimental data for sun and solar drying respectively. Validation
 T.Y. Tunde-Akintunde / Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 2139e2145
of the established model was made by comparing the experimental
moisture ratio values with the predicted ones in any particular
drying experiment under certain conditions. It can be seen that, this
model was in good agreement with the experimental results. This
conrms that the Page model could be used to explain thin-layer
sun or solar drying behavior of chilli pepper.
4. Conclusions
Pretreated chilli pepper dried faster than untreated samples in
all the drying processes. The drying curves of chilli pepper did not
show a constant-rate drying period under the experimental
conditions employed and showed only a falling-rate drying period.
The drying data were tted to Henderson and Pabis, Newton and
Logarithmic and Page models. Four statistical tools were used to
quantify the goodness of tting: the determination of coefcient
(R2), the reduced chi-square (c2), mean bias error (MBE) and root
mean square error (RMSE). The Page model, which gave higher
values of coefcient of determination and lower values of reduced
chi-square, MBE and RMSE was considered the best for predicting
the drying characteristics of sun and solar dried chilli pepper.
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