Summary Flavours can be among the most valuable ingredients in any food formula. Even small amounts of some aroma substance can be expensive, and because they are usually delicate and volatile, preserving them is often a top concern of food manufacturers. Encapsulation describes different processes to cover an active compound with a protective wall material and it can be employed to treat flavours so as to impart some degree of protection against evaporation, reaction, or migration in a food. Encapsulation of flavours has been attempted and commercialized using many different methods such as spray drying, spray chilling or spray cooling, extrusion, freeze drying, coacervation and molecular inclusion. The choice of appropriate microencapsulation technique depends upon the end use of the product and the processing conditions involved in the manufacturing product. This overview describes each method cited above in terms of the basic chemical and/or physical principles involved and covers mechanisms of flavour release from food matrices.

Flavour encapsulation and controlled release - a review.

CuO nanostructures: Synthesis, characterization, growth mechanisms, fundamental properties, and applications

Thermal comfort and building energy consumption implications - A review

Microgrids and Active Distribution Networks offer a potential solution for sustainable, energy-efficient power supply to cater for increasing load growth, supplying power to remote areas, generation of clean power and reduction in emission of greenhouse gases & particulates as per Kyoto protocol.

Microgrids and Active Distribution Networks

Advances in heat pump systems: A review

A computational theoretical model for radiofrequency ablation of tumor with complex vascularization.

A modular versatile heat pump system for drying and air-conditioning is disclosed. The refrigerating components of the heat pump, comprising the compressor (40a), condenser (41), evaporators (45, 52) and expansion valves, are housed in a chassis with three interface ports (74a, 75a, 76a) for easy integration with any air-handling chamber via flexible industrial couplers. For drying application, the design makes use of conventional import/export transport containers with modification for loading and unloading of products. It adopts the first-in first-out process for loading and unloading of the products. For air-conditioning application, the present design can be coupled to the chamber to provide air-conditioning during system repair and maintenance. The proposed heat pump system has several advantages, namely, easy chamber scale-up to meet increase production, significant reduction of production down time, eliminate thermal discomfort during maintenance of refrigeration components for air conditioning systems.

A modular heat pump system for drying and air-conditioning

A dryer simulation model, comprising a material model and an equipment model, has been developed for the drying of food products in a tunnel dryer. The material model, which deals with the drying kinetics of the product, is based on the receding evaporation front phenomenon while the equipment model describes the dynamics of the dryer. The overall model takes into account the shrinkage of the product. Simulation results of the transient moisture content show good agreement with experimental results for two dryers of different drying capacity. We present a design chart relating air temperature and humidity to the required energy for drying and dryer length, which shows an appreciable effect of setting low humidity for low temperature drying. A reduction in dryer energy consumption and chamber size is obtained under this condition. Multi-stage drying is introduced for situations where saturation of the air is likely to occur in the drying chamber. © 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Development of design charts for tunnel dryers

Energy improvement and performance prediction of desiccant coated dehumidifiers based on dimensional and scaling analysis

Research on thermodynamic performance of a novel building cooling system integrating dew point evaporative cooling, air-carrying energy radiant air conditioning and vacuum membrane-based dehumidification (DAV-cooling system)

Kian Jon Chua

Papers

A computational theoretical model for radiofrequency ablation of tumor with complex vascularization.

A modular heat pump system for drying and air-conditioning

Development of design charts for tunnel dryers

Energy improvement and performance prediction of desiccant coated dehumidifiers based on dimensional and scaling analysis

Research on thermodynamic performance of a novel building cooling system integrating dew point evaporative cooling, air-carrying energy radiant air conditioning and vacuum membrane-based dehumidification (DAV-cooling system)