ESTIMATING THE

DRYING PARAMETERS
OF Heinsia crinita USING
NEURAL NETWORKS
 INTRODUCTION
One of the major advances in human history is the
ability to preserve food. It was the prerequisite to man
settling down in one place, instead of moving from
place to place in the never ending hunt for food.
All variety of foods in our daily living needs some
form of preservation to reduce or stop spoilage, to make
it available throughout a year, to maintain desired level
of nutritional properties for the longest possible time
span and to make value added products.
Amongst these, spoilage is the foremost reason for
employing food preservation techniques. Spoilage or
deterioration of foods occurs during handling or due to
mechanical, physical, chemical or microbial damage.
 INTRODUCTION (cont’d)
The earliest preservation technologies
developed were drying, smoking, chilling and
heating. Later on, the art of controlling these
technologies was developed. The work of
Pasteur in the nineteenth century then made it
possible to understand the real mode of
operation of preservation techniques such as
heating, chilling and freezing, providing the
basis for more systematic monitoring and
control.
 INTRODUCTION (cont’d)
The use of various compounds such as salt and spices
to preserve foods was used in ancient times. Unfortunately,
the gradual use of a wider range of chemicals for
preservation such as boron or cumarine sometimes led to
misuse. Irradiation, another physical treatment procedure is
very much under debate in Europe, while one of the oldest
technologies, smoking is now suspected of being
carcinogenic, causing consumers and food industries to pay
their attention to natural SUN-DRYING as one of the best
food preservation methods.
Drying is not just one of the physical treatment
processes for foods that is a commonly used in many
households, it is also an important unit operation used in
numerous industries the world over.
 Aim and Objectives of the Study
The aim of the Study is to model the sun drying of
atama (Heinsia crinita) using Artificial Neural
Network (ANN).
To achieve this aim, I would pursue the
following objectives;
 Explore the drying parameters of Atama (Heinsia

crinita) leaves at different drying periods.

 Calculate the effective moisture diffusivity and

activation energy.
 Model the experimental drying kinetics of Atama

(Heinsia crinita) leaves during its drying process

using Artificial Neural Network methodology.
 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
This study seeks to examine the use of sun-drying
method because of the following reasons;
 it is the oldest method used to dehydrate foods,
 it is all-natural and doesn't require use of electricity
or incur any heating cost whatsoever,
 it is safer, improves the digestibility of foods and has
better nutrient retention capability, and;
 can make some nutrients and food more available for
the ever-growing population.
 MATERIAL TO BE DRIED
Atama, commonly called Bush Apple
(botanical name: Heinsia crinita) is a
scrambling perennial shrub with woody
stems and branches found in the
secondary jungle; usually growing 8 - 13
meters tall in the understorey of high
evergreen forests. It belongs to the
family; Rubiaceae.
It is called “Atama, “Tonoposho” and
“Fumbwa” in Efik, Yoruba, and Igala
dialect respectively. It is native to the
tropical areas of Africa; from Guinea to
Figure 1. Atama plant West Cameroons and Fernando Po, across
the Congo basin up to East and South-
Central Africa. It is cultivated as a source
MATERIAL TO BE DRIED (cont’d)
This vegetable, atama is used for the preparation
of “Abak atama”, a popular soup enjoyed by the Ibibio
people of the lower Cross River basin. The “abak atama”
soup is similar to the “Banga” soup made by the Delta
Igbos.
According to studies, the leaf extract could be
used for the treatment of skin rashes, umbilical hernia
and the leaf is added to the diet of postpartum woman
during which time it is claimed that they aid the
contraction of the uterus (Orsat et al., 2005).
There are three cultivars of atama; the aromatic
ones, the less aromatic ones, and the slightly bitter
ones.
MATERIAL TO BE DRIED (cont’d)
For this study, fresh atama leaves (Heinsia
crinita) would be bought from Akpan Andem
market; a popular market within the Uyo Metropolis
of Akwa Ibom State. To ensure uniformity of
physical characteristics of the specimen, the
samples will be carefully selected with the same
size and sun dried the same day. The initial
moisture content of the sample would be recorded
following the standard method (AOAC, 1990). The
initial moisture content of the sample would be
reported as percentages (%) in wet basis (w.b.) or
kg/kg in dry basis (d.b.).
 METHODOLOGY
1. Drying Experiment
I shall dry the atama leaves under the sun just
outside the laboratory with an average ambient
temperature of say, 39 degrees Celsius. It would be
carefully arranged in a single layer of a tray, and
placed in a convenient position free of any
interference for about 12 hours a day from the daily
hours of 8am and 6pm until the moisture content
of the samples reaches a constant mass.
At periodic intervals, the sample will be
withdrawn and measured using an electric balance
for weight loss within an accuracy of ± 0.01g
during drying.
 METHODOLOGY
2. Calculations
After measuring the sample I would make the
following calculations;
 Moisture Ratio and Drying Rate (MR & DR),

according to equations by Aban et al., (2012).

 Effective Moisture Diffusivity (Deff), according to

equations by Osepchuk, (2002).

 Estimation of Activation Energy (Ea), from the

relationship of Deff and Arrhenius equations
provided by Raghavan and Orsat, (1998).
 METHODOLOGY
3. ANN Prediction
For this study, I shall use the MATLAB
software (Version 7.8, MathWorks, USA) for the
design and testing of this ANN prediction.
The ANN configuration or modelling to be
used would be a multiple-layer perception
“feed-forward,” back propagation network
consisting of three input layer (air temperature,
moisture content and drying time), one hidden
layer, and one output layer (final moisture
content of atama at anytime) with a convergence
criterion for training purposes.
REVIEW OF RELEVANT PAST WORKS
 A number of studies have shown the advantages for fruits and
vegetables drying by a microwave assisted process. A study conducted
by Wei, et al (2005), showed that dried carrots had great quality in
terms of colour, shrinkage and rehydration property.

 A comparative study was conducted by Cui et al., (2003) for garlic

drying. Freeze drying, microwave vacuum drying and hot air drying
effects on loss of pyruvate were compared. It was seen the best dried
garlic quality was obtained with freeze drying and microwave vacuum
drying as a close second. On the other hand there was a great loss in
garlic pungency with the hot air dried samples (recall, heat intensity in
sun drying is not as high as).

 Nsonzi and Ramaswamy (1998) modelled the mass transfer process

with respect to moisture loss and solids gain. They stated that even
though the moisture loss and solids gain occurred at the same time,
the rate of moisture loss was much higher than the rate of solids gain.
 CONCLUSION
 The “Prediction of the Drying Parameters of Atama (Heinsia crinita)
using ANN” would be studied. The method of drying shall be Sun
drying.

 The study would; explore the drying parameters of Atama leaves at

different drying periods, help me make necessary calculations, as well
as enable me to model the experimental drying kinetics of Atama leaves
during its sun-drying process using the Artificial Neural Network
methodology.

 The ANN methodology has over the years been proven by researchers
to adequately describe the drying kinetics and quality changes more
than other several mathematical models, some which are theoretical,
semi theoretical, and empirical.

 Three (3) input variables of air temperature, moisture content, drying

time; and one (1) output which is the final moisture content would be
worked on.