Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78

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Journal of Food Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jfoodeng

Spray drying of inulin component extracted from Jerusalem artichoke

tuber powder using conventional and ohmic-ultrasonic heating for
extraction process
Krittiya Khuenpet a, Mika Fukuoka b, Weerachet Jittanit a, *, Sarote Sirisansaneeyakul c
a
Department of Food Science and Technology, Faculty of Agro-Industry, Kasetsart University, 50 Ngam Wong Wan Road, Chatuchak, Bangkok, 10900,
Thailand
b
Department of Food Science and Technology, Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, 4-5-7 Konan, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan
c
Department of Biotechnology, Faculty of Agro-Industry, Kasetsart University, 50 Ngam Wong Wan Road, Chatuchak, Bangkok, 10900, Thailand

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

Article history: In this study, various ohmic heating conditions and conventional heating were applied in the inulin
Received 7 October 2015 extraction process from Jerusalem artichoke tuber (JAT) powder. The inulin extracts were evaporated to
Received in revised form be around 30
Brix and then spray-dried to be inulin powder. The main objectives were (1) to compare
2 September 2016
the quality of inulin extracts obtained from different extraction conditions and (2) to evaluate the yield of
Accepted 5 September 2016
Available online 8 September 2016
inulin powder production from JAT powder and the inulin powder quality. The results showed that the
electrical conductivities of JAT powder solutions ranged between 0.0677 and 0.2057 S/m. The application
of ohmic heating method at electrical frequency of 20 kHz and electrical eld strengths of 15 and 20 V/
Keywords:
Electrical conductivity
cm could not raise the inulin extraction yield when comparing with the conventional heating. The
Extraction addition of ultrasonic treatment step into the ohmic heating process could not escalate the extraction
Inulin yield. The sugar and inulin contents in the extracts obtained from various ohmic heating treatments and
Jerusalem artichoke conventional heating were not much different. The inulin contents of all extract samples were roughly in
Ohmic heating range between 75 and 80 g/100 gdry mass. The production yields of inulin powder from JAT powder were
14.53e17.29% which was rather low due to the loss of solids occurring in the extraction and spray drying
processes. The scanning electron micrographs illustrated that the particle sizes of inulin powders pro-
duced in this study were much smaller than those of commercial inulin powders.
2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction unit by a-D-glucopyranosoyl bond (Blecker et al., 2002; Ronkart

Jerusalem artichoke (Helianthus tuberosus L.) is a native species
of sunower originally found from Canada and then cultivated
widely in Europe, North America and Asia (Seljasen and Slimestad,
2007). Many varieties of Jerusalem artichoke (JA) were bred,
developed and successfully grown in Thailand especially in the
northeastern region (Vorasoot and Jogloy, 2006; Tanjor et al., 2012).
Jerusalem artichoke tubers (JAT) accumulates inulin instead of
starch as a carbohydrate reserve (Marx et al., 1997; Takeuchi and
Nagashima, 2011).
Inulin is a linear polymer of fructose unit joined by b-(2 / 1) D-
fructosyl-fructose bonds and terminated with/without a glucose
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: fagiwcj@ku.ac.th (W. Jittanit).
et al., 2007). The chain lengths of these fructans or degrees of
polymerization (DP) of inulin range between 2 and 60 units (Van
Loo et al., 1995; Judprasong et al., 2011) depending on species,
harvesting maturity, storage time and production conditions
(Saengthongpinit and Sajjaanantakul, 2005; Stanley and
Nottingham, 2007). Small molecules with DP < 10 are called
fructo-oligosaccharides (FOS) (Sirisansaneeyakul et al., 2007).
Inulin is a non-digestible carbohydrate commonly used by the food
industry as a soluble dietary ber, prebiotic and fat or sugar
replacement (Barclay et al., 2010; Gunnarsson et al., 2014).
The extraction is a key step for the inulin production from JAT. It
is similar to the extraction of sucrose from sugar beets because
inulin is water soluble especially in hot water. One of the most
common methods for isolation of inulin from plants is hot water
extraction (Srinameb et al., 2015). The raw materials for inulin
extraction in industrial practice could be either dried or fresh JAT. If

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jfoodeng.2016.09.009
0260-8774/ 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
68 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78
the factory does not have sufcient facilities to handle all the fresh
JAT in its harvesting season, the JAT should be dried and stored to be
raw material for inulin powder production along the rest of the
year. In case of applying dried raw material, the freshly harvested
JAT would be washed, sliced, blanched, dried and then grounded to
be powder (Khuenpet et al., 2015a,b). The dried JAT is milled to be
powder prior to extraction step in order to raise its specic surface
area, facilitate the mass transfer from inside the particle to the
solvent and subsequently improve the inulin extraction efciency.
For the inulin extraction by applying the fresh JAT, it seems like the
production steps consume less energy than that of dried JAT
because the drying process is not required; however, the fresh JAT
must be processed within a few days due to its short storage life
under atmospheric condition. In Thailand, JAT can be harvested
after 100e140 days planting, and crop yields of JAT are regularly
13e19 ton per hectare (Tiengtam et al., 2015). It would be difcult
and costly for the inulin production factory to process all the freshly
harvested JAT to be inulin powder within the limited time during
harvesting season. Although cold storage might be used for
extending its shelf life, the investment, energy and maintenance
costs are normally not cheap and even more expensive than drying
JAT and then storage under room temperature. Moreover, it was
proved that the chemical compositions in JAT especially inulin
content changed along the storage period in coldroom.
Saengthongpinit and Sajjaanantakul (2005) reported that after 4e6
weeks of cold storage JAT at 2 and 5
C, sucrose and FOS (DP 3e10)
increased and DP > 10 fractions decreased. Drying JAT before
extraction is often essential in order to reduce the degradation and
chemical changes during storage (Marur and Sodex, 1995). More-
over, drying JAT for long term storage enabling factories to ef-
ciently manage their raw material procurement, inventory and
production.
So far, most published researches applied conventional heating
method for the hot water extraction of inulin from JAT. In general,
they used high temperatures between 70 and 100
C and long
duration for their experiments leading to cell tissue alteration and
impurities release into the inulin extract (Franck, 2006; Toneli et al.,
2008; Zhu et al., 2014). Main important factors inuencing on the
yield of inulin extraction include temperature, extraction time and
ratio of solvent and solid (Paseephol et al., 2007; Toneli et al., 2008;
Abou-Arab et al., 2011; Saengkanuk et al., 2011; Apolina
rio et al.,
2014). The increase of extraction temperature, time and solvent
proportion normally results in the inulin extraction yield escala-
tion; however, the energy and time consumption together with the
solvent cost must be considered in order to determine the optimum
condition. Saengthongpinit and Sajjaanantakul (2005) applied hot
deionized water at 80
C for 1 h in inulin extraction from JAT and
coagulated inulin by alcohol precipitation prior to drying. Precipi-
tation of inulin is related to the polarity of solvent. High concen-
tration of ethanol had lower polarity than water resulting in inulin
precipitation (Saengthongpinit, 2005). Luque-Garcia and Luque de
Castro (2003) pointed out that precipitation by alcohol is efcient
and widely used in laboratory; however, it was deemed uneco-
nomical and unsuitable for industrial-scale inulin production due
to the price of alcohol and its recovery cost. Recently, Srinameb
et al. (2015) studied inulin extraction from JAT powder by accel-
erated solvent extractor (ASE) using water as the extraction solvent.
The highest extraction efciency was obtained when the extraction
temperature of 80
C for 20 min was used.
Thus far, there have been some researchers applying the inno-
vative methods such as pulsed electric eld, ohmic heating and
ultrasonic in their extraction processes with the expectation to
raise the extraction efciency when comparing with the conven-
tional method (Milani et al., 2011; Wanpen et al., 2013; Jovanovic-
Malinovska et al., 2015; Loypimai et al., 2015). The pulsed electric
elds were applied by using alternating electric eld at 200 V and
frequency of 50 Hz on extraction of fruit juices from prunes, apples
and grapes; as a result, an increase of juice yield up to 10% was
found (Flaumenbaum, 1949). Zagorulko (1957) and Vorobiev et al.
(2005) described that the increase in extraction yield after
applying pulsed electric eld occurred due to the electrical
breakage of cellular membranes, namely electroplasmolysis phe-
nomena. Wang and Sastry (2002) and Lebovka et al. (2005a,b)
claimed that ohmic heating could induce electropermeabilization
of the cell membranes. Vorobiev and Lebovka (2008) described that
when the electrical current ows through the biological tissue, it
causes both temperature rise and also membrane damage resulting
in the diffusion of solutes inside the cellular structure. Ohmic
heating was successfully applied to increase the efciency of su-
crose extraction from sugar beet, extraction yield of soy milk form
soy beans and beet dye diffusion (Halden et al., 1990; Kim and Pyun,
1995; Lima et al., 2001). Some studies such as Lakkakula et al.
(2004) found that ohmic heating could increase the extraction
yield of rice bran oil from rice bran that is ne particle; however, no
investigation has been conducted on the use of ohmic heating to
extract inulin from ne JAT powder. The applications of ohmic
heating at high frequency have been interested by some re-
searchers due to its fast heating rate. Park et al. (1995), Imai et al.
(1996) and Wu et al. (1998) stated that the heating rate of food
materials depended on the frequency of alternating current during
ohmic heating. Imai et al. (1995) found that heating rate of egg
albumin solution slightly increased as frequency increased. The
heating rate at 10 kHz is 7.5 times greater than that of 50 Hz for sh
protein gel (Park et al., 1995). Another potential technique for
enhancing the extraction yield in food industry is ultrasonic (Mason
et al., 1996). Jovanovic-Malinovska et al. (2015) applied the ultra-
sonic to assist inulin extraction from JAT powder. They reported
that ultrasound assisted extraction by using ethanol concentration
63% v/v, extraction temperature of 40
C and sonication time of
10 min could increase the concentration of extracted inulin from
JAT powder about 4-fold compared with the conventional extrac-
tion that applied ethanol concentration 85% v/v at 50
C for 60 min.
Moreover, Wanpen et al. (2013) investigated the effect of ultrasonic
pretreatment on inulin extraction from JAT and found that the ul-
trasonic pretreatment caused higher mono- and di-saccharides
ratio in inulin extract indicating that ultrasound pretreatment
promoted depolymerization of inulin chain.
Although there have been a number of researches applying
innovative methods for raising the efciency of extraction process,
the published articles related to the inulin extraction from JAT
powder by ohmic heating and ultrasonic are remarkably limited.
Hence, the objectives of this research were (1) to compare the
quality of inulin extracts obtained from different extraction con-
ditions and (2) to evaluate the yield of inulin powder production
from JAT powder and the inulin powder quality.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. JAT powder preparation
Fresh JAT variety JA 102 was supplied by Petchaboon Research
Station, Faculty of Agriculture, Kasetsart University, Thailand. The
fresh JAT was processed to be JAT powder by applying the method
of Khuenpet et al. (2015a,b). The JAT samples were washed and
sliced into 2 mm thickness. The slices were immediately immersed
in 0.5% w/v citric acid solution for 5 min and blanched in boiling
water for 2 min. Then, the slices were dried in a tray dryer at
temperature of 65
C until reaching moisture content equal or less
than 8% dry basis (d.b.). Dried JAT chips were ground into JAT
powder by two milling steps applying a Fitz mill model M5 (The
 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78
Fitzpatrick Company, USA) in the 1st step and an Alpine Augsburg
Pin mill type 160Z (Alpine American Corporation, Natick, MA) in
the 2nd step. The JAT powder was screened by 60 mesh sieves and
then by 80 mesh sieves after the 1st and 2nd stage milling
respectively. The ne JAT powder was stored in aluminium foil bags
before using in the extraction experiments.
2.2. Extraction of inulin from JAT powder
JAT powder was used as raw material for inulin extraction. The
condition for the inulin extraction including the powder to water
ratio, temperature and time of Khuenpet et al. (2015a,b) was
applied in this study. For the extraction experiment, JAT powder
was added with distilled water at the ratio of JAT powder: water at
1:35 (w/w). The extraction processes were conducted by three
different schemes comprising water-bath heating (conventional
method), ohmic heating and ultrasonic combined with ohmic
heating. For all extraction experiments, JAT powder solutions were
heated up to the temperature of 85
C and then holding at this
temperature for 30 min. After that, the solutions were cooled down
under ambient condition before centrifugation in a refrigerated
centrifuge (Himac CF 15RXII, Hitachi, Tokyo, Japan) at 4
C and
8000 rpm for 20 min to separate the sediment. The quality of su-
pernatants was determined in aspects of total solids, soluble solid
content (oBrix) and the contents of sugars and inulin.
2.2.1. Water-bath heating
Water-bath heating is deemed as the conventional heating
method because it relies on heat convection and conduction
mechanisms. For the conventional extraction using water-bath
heating, the JAT powder solution was poured into a beaker and
then placed it in a thermostatic water bath model T-104NA
(Thomas, Tokyo, Japan). The temperature of water inside water
bath was set at 90
C. The sample was stirred with an electric
mixing paddle during the entire extraction process in order to
achieve the uniform temperature inside solution. The temperature
history of solution from the beginning until reaching the temper-
ature of 85
C and holding at this temperature for 30 min was
recorded using type-K thermocouples connected to a Thermodac
multichannel temperature recorder model 5001 A (Eto Denki,
Japan). The temperature of water inside water bath was set slightly
higher than the required sample temperature; otherwise the target
temperature of sample could not be obtained. The experiment was
conducted in 3 replications.
2.2.2. Ohmic heating
2.2.2.1. Ohmic heating apparatus. The ohmic heating devices were
used for both electrical conductivity measurement and extraction
experiment in this study. Schematic diagram of ohmic heating
setup with data acquisition system is shown in Fig. 1. The ohmic
heating system consisted of a power supply source (Frontier Engi-
neering Co., Ltd., Japan), two type-K thermocouples (located at the
centre of ohmic chamber and near the electrode) connected with a
Thermodac multichannel temperature recorder model 5001 A
(Eto Denki, Japan) and two Hioki digital multimeters model
DT4282 (Hioki E.E. Corporation, Japan) linked to a computer for the
temperature, voltage and electrical current data collection. The
ohmic chamber was a cubic-shaped box with the size of 10 cm for
every inner dimension. The chamber was made from acrylic with
titanium electrode in both sides.
2.2.2.2. Electrical conductivity measurement. For the electrical
conductivity measurement, the 10 g of JAT powder were mixed
with 250, 300 and 350 g of distilled water to prepare the JAT
powder solutions at the ratio of JAT powder: water at 1:25, 1:30 and
69
Thermocouple
Electrode Electrode
Sample
Ohmic chamber Data
acquisition
system
V
A
Computer
Power
Supply
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the ohmic heating unit.
1:35 respectively. The solution was then poured into the ohmic
chamber. The electrical conductivity of the solution was measured
by applying 200 V electrical voltage supplied between electrodes
(voltage gradient 20 V/cm) with the frequency of 20 kHz. Moreover,
one additional measurement was conducted for the JAT powder
solution at the ratio of 1:35 by using 150 V electrical voltage
(voltage gradient 15 V/cm) with the frequency of 20 kHz in order to
investigate the effect of applied voltage gradient difference on the
measured electrical conductivity. All the experiments were con-
ducted in 3 replications. During ohmic heating process, the tem-
perature, electrical voltage, and current were recorded every 1 s. In
order to obtain the temperature uniformity of sample during ohmic
heating, the ohmic chamber was placed above a magnetic stirrer
and a 3.5 cm-length magnetic bar was stirred at 300 rpm inside the
solution. The electrical conductivities of samples were calculated
using Equation (1). The graphs indicating the relationship between
the measured electrical conductivities versus temperatures were
plotted. Moreover, the mathematical models for predicting the
electrical conductivity of JAT powder solution as a function of
temperature were developed. The measured electrical conductivity
data would be useful for evaluating the possibility of applying
ohmic heating technique for the inulin extraction from JAT powder.
s IL=AV (1)
where s Electrical conductivity (S/m)
I Electrical current (Ampere)
A Cross sectional area of electrode that contact to sample in
the ohmic chamber (m2)
V Applied voltage (Volt)
L Distance between the electrodes (m)
2.2.2.3. Ohmic heating extraction with/without ultrasonic treatment.
In this study, the effect of applying different levels of electrical eld
strength in ohmic heating extraction and that of applying ohmic
heating extraction with ultrasonic treatment were investigated. For
the ohmic heating extraction, the JAT powder solutions at the ratio
of JAT powder: water at 1:35 were prepared by adding 10 g of JAT
powder into 350 g of distilled water. Two levels of voltage gradi-
ents, 15 V/cm and 20 V/cm were applied with the frequency of
20 kHz. The samples were heated up until reaching the tempera-
ture of 85
C. After that, the supplied voltage was decreased to
70 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78
merely maintain the temperature of solution at 85
C for 30 min.
Similarly to the experiment of electrical conductivity measurement,
the ohmic chamber was placed above a magnetic stirrer and a
3.5 cm-length magnetic bar was stirred at 300 rpm inside the so-
lution. In the case of applying ohmic heating extraction with ul-
trasonic treatment, there were two schemes comprising with (1)
the application of ultrasonic to the JAT powder solution before
ohmic heating and (2) the application of ultrasonic after ohmic
heating of the JAT powder solution. Only the electrical eld
strength of 20 V/cm with the frequency of 20 kHz was applied for
the ohmic heating extraction with ultrasonic treatment. For the
ultrasonic treatment, the JAT powder solutions were poured into a
beaker and placed in an AS ONE ultrasonic cleaner model VS-F100
(As One Corporation, Osaka, Japan) using a frequency of 50 kHz and
power of 100 W for 10 min. All the experiments were carried out in
triplicate.
2.2.2.4. Effect of concentration, temperature and time on ohmic
heating extraction. Apart from the experiments of the ohmic
heating extraction as described in the previous section, a number of
ohmic heating extraction experiments were conducted in order to
investigate the effect of concentration of JAT powder solution,
temperature and time on the inulin extraction by ohmic heating.
Three levels of the ratio of JAT powder: water consisting of 1:25,
1:30 and 1:35 with two levels of extraction temperatures (75 and
85
C) and extraction times (15 and 30 min) were applied for ohmic
heating extraction. The electrical eld strength of 20 V/cm with the
frequency of 20 kHz were used. All the experiments were con-
ducted in triplicate. After ohmic heating, the solutions were cooled
down under ambient condition prior to centrifugation in a refrig-
erated centrifuge (Himac CF 15RXII, Hitachi, Tokyo, Japan) at 4
C
and 8000 rpm for 20 min to separate the sediment. The superna-
tants were collected for quality determination in aspects of total
solids, soluble solid content (oBrix) and the contents of sugars and
inulin.
2.3. Inulin powder production
The solutions obtained from some extraction experimental
conditions comprising with (1) water-bath heating at 85
C for
30 min with the ratio of JAT powder: water at 1:35 (w/w)
(considered as a control condition), (2) an ohmic heating condition
selected from the previous section and (3) water-bath heating
applying the same extraction temperature, time and JAT powder
concentration as the chosen ohmic heating condition were used for
inulin powder production. The inulin solutions were cooled down
under ambient conditions, centrifuged to separate the sediment
out, concentrated to 30 oBrix by boiling on a hot plate under stirring
and then spray dried to be powder. ABUCHI mini spray dryer
model B-290 (BCHI Labortechnik AG, Flawil, Switzerland) was
used at the inlet and outlet drying air temperatures of 160
C and
70
C respectively with the feed rate of 12 mL/min. The inulin
powder was collected and kept in aluminium foil bags for quality
determination.
2.4. Quality determination
Quality of the inulin extract samples obtained after extraction
and centrifugation processes was determined in terms of total
solids, soluble solid content (oBrix) and the contents of sugars and
inulin. Furthermore, the solubility of JAT powder, powder recovery
in spray drying process and production yield of inulin powder from
JAT powder were calculated from the experimental data. Quality of
the extracted samples was determined in aspects of moisture
content, total solids and contents of sugars and inulin. In addition,
the microstructures of inulin powder produced in this study and
commercial inulin grade Orafti HP and Orafti HSI (BENEO,
Belgium) were investigated. All measurements were done in three
replications excepting for the sugars and inulin content determi-
nation that was conducted in duplicate.
2.4.1. Moisture content and total solids
The moisture content was determined by oven method using 2 g
of sample and 105
C drying air temperature until reaching con-
stant weight (AOAC, 2005). The total solids content was considered
as the amount of material remaining after all the water was
removed (Bradley, 2010). Thus, it was calculated using Equation (2).
Total solids % 100
 moisture content % in wet basis; w:b:
(2)
2.4.2. Soluble solid content
The soluble solid content (oBrix) of inulin extract samples were
measured by a HANNA digital refractometer model HI 96801
(Hanna Instruments Inc., Rhode Island, USA).
2.4.3. Sugars content
The contents of sugars (fructose, glucose and sucrose) in inulin
extract and inulin powder specimens were determined using a high
performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) instrument equipped
with an Uniows DG-1210 Degasys degasser (Uniows Co., Ltd.,
Tokyo, Japan), a L-2130 Hitachi LaChrom Elite Pump (Hitachi High-
Technologies Corporation, Tokyo, Japan), a SSC-2300 Column oven
(Senshu Scientic Co., Ltd., Tokyo, Japan), a Shodex SC1011 column
(8 mm  300 mm) and a Shodex RI-201H Refractive Index detector
(Showa Denko K.K., Kanagawa, Japan). The column temperature
was controlled at 80
C with deionized water as the mobile phase at
a ow rate of 1 mL/min.
2.4.4. Inulin content
The inulin content of the inulin extract and powder specimens
were determined using the Megazyme fructan assay kit (Mega-
zyme International Ireland, Ireland). Inulin content values
including inulin and fructooligosaccharides were determined ac-
cording to AOAC Method 999.03 and AACC-32.32. Principally, ex-
tracts of samples were treated with a specic sucrase enzyme and
starch-degrading enzymes to completely hydrolyze these carbo-
hydrates to D-glucose and D-fructose. These sugars were reduced to
sugar alcohols with sodium borohydride while the fructan was
hydrolyzed to D-fructose and D-glucose with a mixture of highly
puried endo- and exo-inulinases, and then D-fructose and D-
glucose derived from fructan was measured using the p-hydrox-
ybenzoic acid hydrazide (PAHBAH) method (Lever, 1973; McCleary,
2000). Therefore, inulin contents presented in this study contained
fructo-oligosaccharide (FOS) and inulin, with degree of polymeri-
zation (DP) greater than 2.
2.4.5. Solubility of JAT powder
The loss of solids contained in JAT powder during extraction and
centrifugation processes could be realized if the solubility per-
centage was calculated using equation (3). The higher solubility
percentage implied that the lower loss of solids occurred. For the
inulin extraction experiment from JAT powder, after extraction and
centrifugation, the weight and total solids content of inulin extracts
were measured whereas the moisture content of JAT powder was
also determined in order to realize the dry solids in powder.
 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78 71

and Duncan's multiple range test in the statistical analysis.

Total solids in collected extractg
Solubitiy%  100 (3)
Dry solids in JAT powderg
3. Results and discussion

3.1. Temperature proles during heating up by water-bath and

2.4.6. Production yield ohmic heating methods

2.4.6.1. Powder recovery in spray drying. The production yield of
spray drying process could be represented by the powder recovery
value. The soluble solid content (oBrix) in the concentrated inulin
extract after evaporation step was measured. Then, the weight of
total soluble solids in the concentrated inulin extract that was fed
into the spray dryer for each experimental run was calculated. Also,
the weight of inulin powder collected from each spray drying
experiment was recorded. The moisture content of inulin powder
was determined. The powder recovery value was estimated using
equation (4).
The temperature proles of JAT powder solutions at the ratio of
powder to water of 1:35 w/w during heating up by water-bath and
ohmic heating methods were plotted as illustrated in Fig. 2. It
appeared that the heating rate of the water-bath heating method
was the highest followed by that of ohmic heating with the applied
voltage gradient of 20 and 15 V/cm, respectively. The heat-up times
from approximately 25
Ce85
C in cases of water-bath heating and
ohmic heating by applying electrical eld strengths of 20 and 15 V/
cm were around 11, 13 and 25 min respectively. The maximum
applied voltage gradient in this study was restricted at 20 V/cm due
to the limitation of the power supply source. It was unsurprising
that the heat-up time when applying electrical eld strength of

Total solids in collected spray dried powderg

Powder recovery%  100 (4)
Total soluble solids in the feedg

2.4.6.2. Production yield of inulin powder. The percentage of pro-
duction yield of inulin powder was calculated applying the data of
total solids weight in inulin powder collected from spray dryer and
the dry mass of JAT powder used as the raw material in extraction
process. The formula for calculation is shown in equation (5).
15 V/cm was two times longer than that of 20 V/cm. It is because the
amount of generated heat inside sample during ohmic heating is
directly correlated to the sample electrical conductivity and the
square of applied voltage gradient (Sastry and Li, 1996;
Tumpanuvatr and Jittanit, 2012; Darvishi et al., 2013; Engchuan

Total solids in collected spray dried powderg

Production yield%  100 (5)
Dry solids in JAT powderg

2.4.7. Microstructure
The microstructures of inulin powders produced in this study
and commercial inulin grade Orafti HP and Orafti HSI (BENEO,
Belgium) were observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM).
According to the product specication, the minimum inulin con-
tents of inulin grade Orafti HP and OraftiHSI are 99.5 and 86 g/
100 gdry mass respectively whereas their average degrees of poly-
merization are higher than 23 and lower than 10 correspondingly.
Samples were sprinkled onto carbon double-sided tape on SEM
stubs. Then samples were sputtered with platinum (Pt) and palla-
dium (Pd) using an Ion Sputter (Hitachi E-1030 Ion Sputter, Hita-
chinaka, Japan). Observation of the samples was performed using a
Hitachi S-4000 scanning electron microscope (Ibaraki, Japan). The
samples were then subjected to an electron beam of energy under
vacuum to obtain the micrograph with acceleration voltage of
15 kV. The magnication of 1000 times was applied.
Fig. 2. Temperature proles of the JAT powder solutions during heating up and
holding periods by water-bath and ohmic heating methods; (A) water-bath heating,
2.5. Statistical analysis () ohmic heating at 20 V/cm and (,) ohmic heating at 15 V/cm. The temperatures
were the average values of temperatures measured by two thermocouples locating at
SPSS version 12.0 was used for the analysis of variance (ANOVA) the centre of ohmic chamber and near the electrode.
72
and Jittanit, 2013; Engchuan et al., 2014). Therefore, the heat-up
time of ohmic heating method could be similar to that of water-
bath heating by raising the applied voltage gradient to be slightly
higher than 20 V/cm. The trends of heating proles in Fig. 2 indi-
cated that the sample temperature rapidly increased during the
beginning of water-bath heating but the heating rate decreased
later on. On the other hand, the heating rates in case of ohmic
heating were rather stable. The explanation for this phenomenon is
that for the conventional heating by water bath that relies on heat
conduction and convection mechanisms, the amount of transferred
heat from hot water in water bath to the JAT powder solution inside
beaker depended on the temperature difference between heating
medium in water bath and the sample. As a result, when the sample
was heated until the sample temperature was close to the hot water
temperature in water bath, the transferred heat from hot water to
the JAT powder solution dropped while the heat loss from the JAT
powder solution to the surrounding atmosphere especially the heat
loss due to the water evaporation from the solution rose leading to
the obviously slow increasing temperature of sample during the
later heating period. In addition, when the temperature of JAT
powder solution reached 85
C, the balance between the trans-
ferred heat from hot water to the JAT powder solution and the heat
loss from the solution to the surrounding atmosphere occurred
leading to the steady-state condition of JAT sample temperature as
illustrated in Fig. 2. Dissimilarly, for the ohmic heating the heat was
directly generated inside the sample. Therefore, the amount of
generated heat increased along the heating period due to the
escalation of electrical conductivities of sample when the temper-
ature was raised. Nonetheless, the temperature proles of ohmi-
cally heated samples were rather linear instead of exponential as
illustrated in Fig. 2 because the heat loss from the JAT powder so-
lution to the surrounding atmosphere also rose when the sample
was heated to the higher temperature. The temperatures of
ohmically heated JAT powder solutions were maintained after
climbing up to 85
C by manually adjusting the supplied voltage to
the samples.
3.2. Electrical conductivities of JAT powder solutions
Electrical conductivity is the most vital properties of food ma-
terials that inuence to the amount of generated heat in the ohmic
heating process (Sastry and Li, 1996; Sastry and Barach, 2000;
Goullieux and Pain, 2005; Engchuan and Jittanit, 2013). The food
0.25
0.20
Electrical conductivity (S/m)
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.00
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Temperature (oC)
Fig. 3. Electrical conductivities of JAT powder solutions at the temperatures between
25 and 85
C in cases of applying different voltage gradients and ratio of JAT powder to
water; (:) 15 V/cm, JAT powder:water 1:35 ( ), 20 V/cm, JAT powder:water 1:25 ( ),
20 V/cm, JAT powder:water 1:30 and ( ) 20 V/cm, JAT powder:water 1:35.
K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78
materials with electrical conductivities in the range of 0.01e10 S/m
are considered appropriate for ohmic heating (Lyng and McKenna,
2007). The electrical conductivity of food is strongly affected by its
ionic content, moisture mobility, and physical structure (Zhang,
2007; Srivastav and Roy, 2014). The electrical conductivities of
JAT powder solutions during ohmic heating when applying
different voltage gradients (15 and 20 V/cm) and ratio of JAT
powder to water (1:25, 1:30 and 1:35 w/w) are shown in Fig. 3. The
results indicated that the electrical conductivities of JAT powder
solutions fell in the range between 0.0677 and 0.2057 S/m that
were deemed high enough for applying ohmic heating. Therefore, it
is possible to efciently apply ohmic heating technique for inulin
extraction from JAT powder solutions. Furthermore, it was found
that the electrical conductivities of JAT powder solutions increased
linearly along the rising temperatures from 25 to 85
C. This result
went along with the published data of Icier and Ilicali (2005),
Darvishi et al. (2011, 2012) which measured electrical conductiv-
ities of orange juice concentrate, lemon juice and tomato paste
during ohmic heating correspondingly. When the solution was
heated by ohmic heating, the electrical conductivity values
increased due to faster movement of ions. The linear relationships
between electrical conductivities of the JAT powder solutions and
temperatures were determined by tting the experimental data
using the least square method as presented in Table 1. In addition, a
multi-regression model to predict electrical conductivity as a
function of the temperature and JAT: water ratio was developed.
These mathematical models can be utilized for predicting the
electrical conductivities of the JAT powder solutions during ohmic
heating. The concentrations of JAT powder in the solutions were
another factor affecting on the electrical conductivity. It is clear that
the solution with more proportion of JAT powder had higher value
of electrical conductivity as shown in the multi-regression model in
Table 1. This can be explained by the greater amount of ionic con-
tent or charge carriers in the solution that contained higher pro-
portion of JAT powder. According to Kays and Nottingham (2008),
fresh JAT contains various minerals, especially rich in iron (0.4e3.7
mg/100 g), calcium (14e37 mg/100 g) and potassium (420e657
mg/100 g). In addition, the result indicated that there was no sig-
nicant effect of the difference in the applied voltage gradient (15
and 20 V/cm) on the electrical conductivity of JAT powder solutions
(p > 0.05).
3.3. Comparison between different inulin extraction methods
JAT powder was used as the raw material for inulin extraction.
There were ve extraction conditions applied in this work as the
result shown in Table 2. It appeared that the heat-up time to ach-
ieve the target temperature of 85
C in case of water-bath heating
was 10.89 min whereas that of ohmic heating at electrical eld
strength of 20 V/cm for either with or without ultrasonic applica-
tion ranged between 12.61 and 12.95 min. This indicated that the
application of ultrasonic did not have signicant effect on the heat-
up time for ohmic heating (p > 0.05) while the increase of electrical
eld strength could obviously shorten the heat-up time. The
generated heat inside sample during ohmic heating is directly
dependent on the applied voltage gradient as previously
mentioned. For the total solids, soluble solid content and the sol-
ubility of JAT powder in the inulin extracts, it appeared that the
application of ohmic heating resulted in the signicantly higher
70 80 90 100 total solids and soluble solid content; however, there was insig-
nicant difference in the solubility of JAT powder among almost all
treatments. According to the formula for calculating solubility
percentage as shown in equation (3), this result implied that the
higher total solids and soluble solid contents in the ohmically inulin
extracts caused by more amount of dry mass contents in the JAT
 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78 73

Table 1
The mathematical models showing the relationships between the electrical conductivities of JAT powder solution and temperatures under various ohmic heating conditions.

Voltage gradient (V/cm) JATP: water Model R2

15 1:35 s 0.0016T 0.0264 0.9995

20 1:25 s 0.002T 0.0338 0.9996
20 1:30 s 0.0018T 0.0302 0.9996
20 1:35 s 0.0016T 0.0263 0.9996
20 1:25e1:35 s (0.0347x 0.0006)T (0.6488x 0.0081) 0.97

Remark: T Temperature (
C); x JAT: water ratio such as 1:35 0.029, 1:25 0.040.

Table 2
The heat-up time of the JAT powder solutions heated by different conditions and the quality of inulin extracts.

Heating condition Heat-up time (min) Quality of inulin extract

Total solids (%) Soluble solid Solubility of JAT Fructose content Sucrose Inulin content
content (oBrix) powder (%) (g/100 gdry mass) content (g/100 gdry mass)
(g/100 gdry mass)

Water bath heating 10.89a 0.92 1.87a 0.01 1.80a 0.01 58.95b 0.42 2.67a 0.09 5.66c 0.09 76.86ab 1.87
Ohmic heating at 15 V/cm 24.84c 0.44 1.92b 0.00 1.90b 0.00 59.51c 0.34 2.60a 0.39 4.95ab 0.32 77.60ab 1.37
Ohmic heating at 20 V/cm 12.61b 0.16 1.97c 0.00 2.00c 0.00 59.89c 0.13 2.46a 0.18 4.83a 0.09 80.85 1.09
Ultrasonic for 10 min 12.95b 0.10 1.87a 0.01 1.87b 0.06 57.91a 0.95 2.62a 0.12 5.24b 0.08 77.99b 1.85
after Ohmic
heating at 20 V/cm
Ultrasonic 10 min before 12.79b 0.25 1.88a 0.01 1.90b 0.00 58.45ab 0.47 2.62a 0.07 4.94ab 0.03 75.58a 0.37
Ohmic heating
at 20 V/cm

Remark: For all experiments, the ratio of JAT powder: water was 1:35 (w/w) while JAT powder solutions were heated up to 85
C and then holding for 30 min. None of samples
contained glucose. Different letters in the same column indicate that values are signicantly different (p < 0.05).

powder. In the other words, the JAT powder sample used as the raw
material in ohmic treatment contained slightly lower moisture
than that of water-bath heating treatment. Therefore, the benet of
applying ohmic heating method on the extraction yield remained
ambiguous in this study. Furthermore, the application of ultrasonic
in either before or after ohmic heating could not raise the extrac-
tion yield from JAT powder. The result in this work is contrast to
that of Wang (1995), Kim and Pyun (1995), Lima and Sastry (1999),
Sastry and Barach (2000) and Wang and Sastry (2002) which
claimed that the ohmic heating could enhance extraction yields of
some food materials. The explanation is that the extraction tem-
perature and time are the key factors inuencing to the inulin
extraction yield from JAT powder more than the heating methods
used. Moreover, in this work the ohmic heating was conducted by
using the electrical frequency at 20 kHz due to the ohmic heating
system design with expectation that high electrical frequency
would provide the fast heating rate and some positive effects on the
inulin extraction. This frequency level is deemed very high whereas
most researches in this area that were previously mentioned
applied low frequency in the range of 10e60 Hz. Wang (1995)
applied ohmic heating pretreatment to the fresh apple pieces at
electrical frequency of 60 Hz and eld strength of 40 V/cm to
enhance the extraction yield of juice extraction. Lima and Sastry
(1999) pointed out that the juice yield of pressed apple cossettes
would be higher if applying ohmic heating at lower electrical fre-
quencies. Sastry and Barach (2000) hypothesized that the
enhancement of mass transfer effects seen in low frequency ohmic
heating (50e60 Hz) occurred due to the increased time that cell
walls were exposed to alternating current, which allows the cell
walls to build up charges and form pores. This process is known as
electroporation. According to Kulshrestha and Sastry (2003), the
mass transfer of betanins in beet root was enhanced when the low
electrical frequency (10 and 50 Hz) and eld strength (10e20 V/cm)
were applied. Furthermore, Kulshrestha and Sastry (2006)
concluded that if the low frequency was used in ohmic heating, it
would cause the greater permeabilization in the cellular food
material than conventional heating. Another explanation for the
comparable extraction yield from JAT powder between conven-
tional and ohmic heating is that the raw material for the inulin
extraction was in the powder form which is considered easy-to-
extract due to its ne particle size and subsequently high specic
surface area; hence, the effect of the ohmic method on the per-
meabilization in the cell structure would not be apparent. Although
in this study it appeared that the ohmic heating could not raise the
inulin extraction yield comparing with that of conventional heat-
ing, an advantage of ohmic heating that should be deemed is that
the boiler for supplying either steam or hot water as the heating
mediums during the extraction process would not be required in
case of applying ohmic heating due to its direct heating concept.
The direct heating concept of ohmic heating does not require the
heat conduction and convection mechanisms; therefore, the heat
transfer surface and heating medium are not used. Hence, the in-
vestment cost for the boiler and piping system could be saved.
Moreover, the energy cost for heating up the system to build the
steam pressure and the heat loss in the equipment and piping
system would be decreased.
The combination of ultrasonic in either after or before ohmic
heating did not raise the extraction yield from JAT powder. This
result did not go along with that of Jovanovic-Malinovska et al.
(2015) which found that the application of ultrasonic for 10 min
could increase the concentration of extracted inulin from JAT
powder about 4-fold compared to the conventional extraction. The
reason for this contradictory result is that the temperature for
extraction process in this work was specied at 85
C whereas
Jovanovic-Malinovska et al. (2015) applied much lower tempera-
tures (between 40 and 50
C); as a result, in this study the effect of
high temperature on the extraction yield from JAT powder was
more distinctive and overwhelm the inuence of ultrasonic
treatment.
The results of determination of fructose, glucose, sucrose and
inulin contents were presented in Table 2. It appeared that the
sugar and inulin contents in the extracts obtained from all ve
74 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78

Table 3
The heat-up time of the JAT powder solutions heated by different ohmic heating conditions with electrical eld strength of 20 V/cm and the quality of inulin extracts.

Treatment Extraction Heat-up time (min) Total solids (%) Soluble solid content (oBrix) Solubility of JAT powder (%)

Ratio (JAT powder: water) Temp (
C) Time (min)

1 1:25 75 15 8.50a 0.00 2.58ef 0.01 2.73d 0.27 55.25ab 1.33

2 1:25 75 30 8.25a 0.35 2.55e 0.02 2.52c 0.13 55.13ab 0.78
3 1:25 85 15 10.00b 0.00 2.45d 0.07 2.47c 0.15 54.13a 1.50
4 1:25 85 30 10.00b 0.71 2.60f 0.01 2.57cd 0.08 54.88ab 1.34
5 1:30 75 15 9.75b 0.35 2.13c 0.01 2.20b 0.22 56.25bcd 0.43
6 1:30 75 30 10.00b 0.00 2.14c 0.04 2.22b 0.24 56.70bcde 0.27
7 1:30 85 15 11.00c 0.71 2.16c 0.00 2.17b 0.19 56.10abc 0.90
8 1:30 85 30 11.25c 0.35 2.15c 0.02 2.15b 0.16 56.71bcde 0.17
9 1:35 75 15 11.00c 0.00 1.82a 0.03 1.95a 0.16 56.71bcde 0.36
10 1:35 75 30 11.25c 0.35 1.83a 0.02 1.93a 0.15 58.11cde 1.03
11 1:35 85 15 13.00d 0.00 1.81a 0.02 1.88a 0.10 58.30de 0.26
12 1:35 85 30 12.75d 0.35 1.86b 0.02 1.90a 0.11 58.37e 0.48

Remark: Different letters in the same column indicate that values are signicantly different (p < 0.05).

Table 4
Experimental data obtained from inulin powder production processes and calculated production yields.

Description Extraction condition

Water-bath heating Ohmic heating Water-bath heating

at 85
C for 30 min at 75
C for 30 min at 75
C for 30 min

JAT powder (g) 62.86 0.00 85.68 0.00 62.86 0.00

Moisture content of JAT powder (% w.b.) 4.81 0.02 4.81 0.02 4.81 0.02
Dry solid in JAT powder (g) 59.83 0.00 81.56 0.00 59.83 0.00
o
Brix of concentrated extract 30.05 0.07 30.20 0.08 30.20 0.08
Weight of concentrated extract (g) 100.82 4.50 153.76 1.45 108.99 1.94
Estimated total solid in the feed (g) 30.29 1.28 46.44 0.87 32.92 0.90
Powder collected from spray drying (g) 9.23 0.20 15.11 0.40 9.85 0.03
Moisture content of spray dried powder (% w.b.) 5.82 0.27 6.69 0.09 5.42 0.18
Total solid in collected spray dried powder (g) 8.69 0.19 14.10 0.38 9.31 0.02

Powder recovery in spray drying (%) 30.48 0.63 32.55 0.25 29.92 0.74
Production yield of inulin powder (%) 14.53 0.32 17.29 0.46 15.56 0.04

Inulin content in inulin powder (g/100 gdry mass) 75.62 1.19 77.29 0.34 78.42 0.94
Estimated inulin content from 100 g of JAT powder (g) 10.46 0.23 12.72 0.34 11.62 0.03

Remark:

Estimated inulin content from 100g of JAT powderg

 
100  moisture content of JAT powder
production yield of inulin powder%  100g of JAT powder   inulin content in inulin powder g=100 gdry mass
100

treatments were not much different. The majority of solid in all comparison with the sugar and inulin contents of the JAT powder,
extract samples were inulin with the range of 75.58e80.85 g/100 the extraction process applied in this study could increase the
gdry mass while the fructose and sucrose contents were between inulin content in JAT inulin extract as the result presented in
2.46 e 2.67 and 4.83e5.66 g/100 gdry mass correspondingly. None of Table 5.
samples contained glucose. The remaining proportion should be
other compositions that were soluble in hot water such as ash and
3.4. Effect of concentration, temperature and time on ohmic heating
protein. In agreement with the study of Lon car et al. (2007), JAT
extraction
extracts contain fructose, probably small amount of glucose, FOS
with different degree of polymerization and inulin. According to
Apart from the application of ohmic heating to compare the
Fleming and Groot Wassink (1979), the fresh JAT is composed of
heat-up time and quality of inulin extracts between different
about 80% moisture, and the remaining 20% of solids consist of
extraction schemes as the result shown in the previous section, the
inulin for about 85%, ash for about 5%, and protein, cellulosic ma-
application of ohmic heating in the inulin extraction from JAT
terial and sugars for the rest. Judprasong et al. (2011) found that the
powder was carried out in more thorough aspects by varying the
fructose, glucose and sucrose contents in fresh JAT were 1.27, 0.15
concentration of the JAT powder solution, extraction temperature
and 5.67 g/100 gdry mass correspondingly. In addition, Prangviset
and time. The results of heat-up time, total solids, soluble solid
(2011) reported that JAT powder variety HEL 66 (prepared by
content and the solubility of JAT powder in the inulin extracts are
peeling/non-blanching prior to drying) contains carbohydrate
presented in Table 3. It appeared that the heat-up time for heating
contents 88.65% (inulin 60.66%, insoluble dietary ber 8.16%, solu-
the JAT powder solution from 25
C to the target extraction tem-
ble dietary ber 2.23% and sugars 17.6%). However, the composition
perature (75 or 85
C) decreased signicantly (p < 0.05) when the
also depends on species, harvesting maturity, storage time growing
concentration of JAT powder was raised. So, the treatments that
conditions and processing technique (Saengthongpinit and
applied the ratio of JAT powder to water at 1:25 required the
Sajjaanantakul, 2005; Stanley and Nottingham, 2007). In
shortest heat-up time. The explanation is that the electrical
 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78 75

Table 5
The sugar and inulin contents in JAT powder and inulin powder samples produced by different extraction conditions.

Sample Fructose content (g/100 gdry mass) Sucrose content (g/100 gdry mass) Inulin content (g/100 gdry mass)

JAT powder 2.29a 0.13 3.88a 0.02 54.86a 2.17

Inulin powder
Water-bath heating at 85
C for 30 min 4.06c 0.30 6.25d 0.03 75.62b 1.19
Ohmic heating at 75
C for 30 min 3.13b 0.35 4.64c 0.11 77.29b 0.34
Water-bath heating at 75
C for 30 min 3.85c 0.36 4.42b 0.05 78.42b 0.94

Remark: None of samples contained glucose. Different letters in the same column indicate that values are signicantly different (p < 0.05).

conductivity of the sample with higher JAT powder concentration is
higher than that of lower concentration as illustrated in Fig. 3
leading to the larger amount of generated heat during ohmic
heating. Sastry and Li (1996), Sastry and Barach (2000), Goullieux
and Pain (2005), Tumpanuvatr and Jittanit (2012) and Engchuan
and Jittanit (2013) afrmed that the amount of generated heat in
the ohmic heating process directly relies on the electrical conduc-
tivity of sample.
For the total solids, soluble solid content and the solubility of JAT
powder in the inulin extracts, it was unsurprising that the increase
in the JAT powder concentration resulted in the higher values of
total solids and soluble solid content; however, it was interesting
that at the same concentration of JAT powder, the increase of
extraction temperature from 75 to 85
C and holding time from 15
to 30 min did not have signicant effect on the total solids, soluble
solid content and solubility of JAT powder in the inulin extracts.
Therefore, the application of ohmic heating extraction at 75
C and
holding time for 15 min should be chosen in order to save time and
90.00
abc
80.00 ab a inulin contents. As depicted in Fig. 5, the higher proportion of water
Content (g/100 gdry mass)
subsequently energy consumption. Another point that should be
highlighted is that the increase of water proportion in the solution
from 1:25 to 1:30 and 1:35 could signicantly escalate the solubi-
lity of JAT powder. Nonetheless, in practice the inulin manufacturer
have to leverage the benet from the increase of inulin extracted
with the costs of the additional amount of water and energy con-
sumption in evaporation and spray drying processes before making
the decision for the production process design.
Fig. 4 illustrated the fructose, sucrose and inulin contents of the
inulin extract samples from all treatments. The glucose was not
found in all samples. The sugar and inulin contents in the extracts
obtained from all twelve treatments were not much different. As
expected, the largest proportion of solid in all extract samples were
inulin with the range of 76.44e80.05 g/100 gdry mass whereas the
fructose and sucrose contents fell between 2.63 e 3.02 and
5.03e6.28 g/100 gdry mass correspondingly. According to the result
of analysis of variance (ANOVA), it appeared that in this study, only
the ratio of JAT powder to water was main effect on inulin and
sucrose content whereas there was no main effect on the fructose
content. Moreover, there was no interaction effect between factors
(ratio of JAT powder to water, temperature and time) on sugar and
abc abc abc abc abc bc c c abc

70.00 enhanced inulin content but lessened the sucrose content in dry
60.00 mass of extracts. The reason for this occurrence is that the sugars
50.00 such as fructose, glucose and sucrose could be easily dissolved or
40.00 extracted from the JAT powder into water but the inulin has less
30.00 solubility than these sugars; thus, it needs more driving force for
20.00 extracting it from the cellular structure of JAT powder into the
10.00 bc c c c c bc c a bc ab a ab a
bc bc c c c ab c c a c bc water. More driving force for inulin extraction can be obtained by
0.00
T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9 T10 T11 T12 raising the proportion of water. The ratio of JAT powder to water at
Fructose 2.88 2.86 2.87 3.02 2.96 2.92 2.66 2.91 2.90 2.63 2.91 2.88 1:25 might be able to extract almost all of the sugars; as a result, the
Sucrose 5.95 6.10 5.99 6.28 5.84 5.88 5.03 5.83 5.33 5.28 5.30 5.25 increase of JAT powder to water ratio to 1:30 and 1:35 did not raise
Inulin 76.76 77.62 76.44 77.57 77.62 77.89 78.59 78.38 79.41 80.05 79.91 78.60
the amount of extracted sugars in the solution. On the other hand,
Fructose Sucrose Inulin the increase of JAT powder to water ratio to 1:35 enhanced the
amount of extracted inulin in the solution. Almost the same
Fig. 4. The contents of fructose (,), sucrose (-) and inulin ( ) in extract samples
obtained from different ohmic heating treatments (T1 e T12). Values with the same amount of sucrose in the extract and the higher amount of inulin in
superscript letters were not signicantly different (Duncan test, 5% level). The error case of applying more proportion of water resulted in the
bars represent the standard data deviations.

8.00 100.00
Sucrose content (g/100 gdry mass)

Inulin content (g/100 gdry mass)

7.00 c a b
b a
80.00
6.00 a
5.00 60.00
4.00
3.00 40.00
2.00 20.00
1.00
0.00 0.00
1 to 25 1 to 30 1 to 35 1 to 25 1 to 30 1 to 35
JAT powder : water ratio JAT powder : water ratio

Fig. 5. ANOVA results indicating the main effect of JAT powder to water ratio on the sucrose and inulin content in dry mass of extracts. Values with the same superscript letters were
not signicantly different (Duncan's test, 5% level). The error bars represent the standard data deviations.
76 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78
signicantly lower sucrose content and higher inulin content in the
dry mass of extract. According to Milani et al. (2011), the inulin
extraction yield increased signicantly when the amount of water
used for the extraction was increased. This is because more liquid
was able to increase the driving force of inulin out of the powder
and then release to the medium.
3.5. The inulin powder production and the inulin powder quality
According to the result in the previous section, the ohmic
heating treatment no. 10 (JAT powder: water at 1:35, 75
C 30 min)
was considered as an efcient extraction treatment due to its high
inulin extraction yield and lower energy requirement for heating
during extraction process than that of 85
C extraction tempera-
ture. Therefore, for the inulin powder production, the solution
obtained from this treatment was used. Moreover, the inulin ex-
tracts from two conventional extraction methods comprising with
(1) water-bath heating at 85
C for 30 min with the ratio of JAT
powder: water at 1:35 (w/w) and (2) water-bath heating applying
the same extraction temperature, time and JAT powder concen-
tration as the chosen ohmic heating condition (treatment no. 10)
were processed to be inulin powder. The amounts of JAT powder
used in water bath heating and ohmic heating experiments were
dissimilar because the volumes of sample containers applied in
water bath heating and ohmic heating were not equal. The exper-
imental data obtained from inulin powder production processes are
presented in Table 4. It was noticed that the values of powder re-
covery ranged between 29.92 and 30.42% that was deemed rather
low. This caused by the loss of inulin in the drying chamber due to
the hygroscopic characteristic of the inulin powder. Furthermore,
the conceptual design of spray dryer is important. For the BUCHI
mini spray dryer applied in this study, the ow direction of the feed
and drying air was co-current ow. The inulin powder near the
outlet of drying chamber contacted to the outlet drying air which
had much lower temperature and more humidity than the inlet
drying air leading to higher risk of hygroscopicity and subsequently
Fig. 6. Scanning electron microscopy at 1,000 magnication of inulin powders; (a) inulin powder in case of water-bath heating at 85
C for 30 min, (b) inulin powder in case of
ohmic heating at 75
C for 30 min, (c) inulin powder in case of water-bath heating at 75
C for 30 min, (d) inulin powder grade Orafti HSI and (e) inulin powder grade Orafti HP.
stickiness of inulin powder product than that of the countercurrent
spray dryer design. The production yields of inulin powder in this
study ranged between 14.53 and 17.29% implying that the
14.53e17.29 gdry mass of inulin powder can be produced by using
100 gdry mass of JAT power as raw material. Referring to the exper-
imental data in Table 4, the major loss of solids occurred in the
extraction and spray drying process.
The fructose, glucose, sucrose and inulin contents in JAT powder
and inulin powder samples are shown in Table 5. Similarly to the
prior result, the glucose was not found in all samples. It was clear
that the fructose, sucrose and inulin in JAT powder (raw material)
were lower than those of spray-dried inulin powder samples
indicating that all the extraction methods applied in this study
together with the centrifugation process could remove some im-
purities especially the insoluble solids. For the JAT powder, the rest
percentage of dry mass should be ash, protein and cellulosic ma-
terials while for the inulin powder samples it should be soluble
solids such as ash and protein. The inulin contents of all inulin
powder samples were insignicantly different whereas the fructose
and sucrose contents were slightly different between some treat-
ments. Thus, the effect of different extraction treatments applied in
this section on the sugar and inulin contents was not obvious.
3.6. Microstructures of inulin powders
The microstructures of spray-dried inulin powders produced in
this study and commercial inulin powders grade Orafti HP and
Orafti HSI were depicted in Fig. 6. The SEM micrographs illustrated
that the shape, size and structure of inulin powders produced by
three different extraction conditions were similar. However, the
average size of inulin powder in case of ohmic heating 75
C for
30 min seemed to be slightly larger than those of water bath
heating at 85
C for 30 min and water bath heating at 75
C for
30 min respectively. The average particle sizes of inulin powders
manufactured in this study might be related to their moisture
contents because their compositions and degree of polymerization
 K. Khuenpet et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 194 (2017) 67e78
of inulin should be alike. The higher moisture resulted in the
swollen particles and subsequently larger average particle sizes.
Table 4 shows that the moisture contents of inulin powders in case
of ohmic heating 75
C for 30 min, water bath heating at 85
C for
30 min and 75
C for 30 min were 6.69, 5.82 and 5.42%w.b. corre-
spondingly. In addition, it is clear that the particle sizes of com-
mercial inulin powders grade Orafti HSI and Orafti HP were
much bigger than those of inulin powders produced in this work. It
should be caused by the different production techniques. The
average particle sizes of inulin powders produced in this study
were smaller because they were processed to be powder by spray
drying process using pneumatic nozzle (two-uid nozzle) whereas
the commercial inulin powders might be either dried by spray
dryer using dissimilar specication of atomizer such as rotary
atomizer at low rotation speed to cause bigger droplets or pro-
cessed to be powder by applying crystallization, centrifugation to
separate the crystalized particles and then hot air drying same as
the production process in sugar industry.
4. Conclusions
Ohmic heating technique could be applied for inulin extraction
from JAT powder due to the adequately high electrical conductiv-
ities of JAT powder solutions. The application of ohmic heating
method could not raise the inulin extraction yield comparing with
the conventional heating. It should be because the extraction
temperature and time are the key factors inuencing to the inulin
extraction yield more than the heating methods used. Moreover,
the electrical frequency applied in ohmic heating experiment might
be too high. Also, the raw material for the inulin extraction was in
the ne powder form which is easy-to-extract by conventional
heating. The combination of ultrasonic with ohmic heating did not
escalate the extraction yield. The sugar and inulin contents in the
extracts obtained from all extraction methods in this study were
similar. The increase of extraction temperature from 75 to 85
C and
holding time from 15 to 30 min did not have signicant effect on
the extraction yield; however, the increase of water proportion in
the solution could signicantly escalate the solubility of JAT pow-
der. The production yields of inulin powder were rather low due to
the loss of solids occurring in the extraction and spray drying
processes. The particle sizes of commercial inulin powders were
much larger than those of inulin powders produced in this work. It
should be caused by the different production techniques.
Acknowledgements
This research was jointly funded by Kasetsart University and the
Thailand Research Fund. The authors would like to convey special
appreciation to the Department of Food Science and Technology,
Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology in Japan for the
support of the facilities for conducting this research.
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