Yusuf Byaruhanga | Makerere University (original) (raw)

Papers by Yusuf Byaruhanga

Food ScienTech Journal

Increased commercialization of indigenous fermented foods requires availability of affordable sta... more Increased commercialization of indigenous fermented foods requires availability of affordable starter cultures. The starters should also maintain functionality when stored at ambient conditions, especially where erratic power supply makes constant refrigeration unachievable. This study evaluated the survival of Lactobacillus plantarum MNC 21 starter culture air-dried (at 25 or 30°C) in sorghum flour and stored at 25°C for 30 days. Two sorghum varieties (malted and un-malted) were used. To determine their fermentation efficiency during storage, sterile sorghum malt slurries were inoculated with the dried culture and fermented at 30°C for 24 h. Acidification potential was determined at 5 days intervals by measuring microbial counts, pH and titratable acidity. Microbial concentrations dropped from 8-9 log cfu/g on day 0 to 1 log cfu/g on day 30. Sorghum variety and whether it was malted or un-malted did not affect culture survival. Culture dried at 25C had better survival during the first 10 days (8-9 log cfu/g) than that dried at 30C (8 log cfu/g) but survival between days 20-30 was similar (1-4 log cfu/g). The acidification potential (ability to reduce pH to ≤4.5) decreased with storage time: 4 h (day 0), 24 h (day 15), > 24 h (day 20) to no acidification (days 25-30). Air drying of starter cultures in sorghum flours coupled with storage at ambient temperatures could be adopted as a short-term preservation method. This low-cost technology is suitable for processors in developing countries where maintenance of a cold chain is hampered by unreliable electricity supply.

African eggplant (Solanum anguivi Lam.) fruits reportedly exhibit antidiabetic properties, possib... more African eggplant (Solanum anguivi Lam.) fruits reportedly exhibit antidiabetic properties, possibly due to the presence of bioactive compounds. This study aimed to assess the bioactive compounds content (BCC) and antioxidant activity (AA) in the fruits of fourteen African eggplant accessions. The relationship between the fruit BCC and AA, and the plant (leaf, stem and fruit) morphological characteristics was determined. Morphological traits for the plant accessions were characterized based on existing Solanum species descriptors. Total phenolics, flavonoids, saponins, vitamin C and AA were determined by spectrophotometry, while total alkaloids were detected by gravimetry. HPLC was used for the quantification of phenolic compounds. Morphological characteristics, BCC and AA differed among the accessions. The fruit's accessions contained total phenolics (8.0-12.4 mg gallic acid equivalent/g dry weight (DW)), saponins (51.1-124.8 mg diosgenin equivalent/g DW), alkaloids (81.4-127.7 ...

International Journal Of Scientific Advances, 2021

Previous studies have reported the presence of aflatoxins (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2), heavy meta... more Previous studies have reported the presence of aflatoxins (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2), heavy metals (As, Cd and Pb) and organochlorine pesticide residues (OCPs) in rice sold in Uganda. However, the potential health effects associated with consumption of rice have not been evaluated. The aim of this study was to evaluate the health risk of consuming rice sold in Uganda. A total of 45 packed and 30 open traded rice samples were randomly collected from retail outlets in the main rice trading areas of Uganda. Rice was analysed for AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2, As, Cd, Pb and OCPs using AOAC standard methods. Dietary exposure of the consumers to contaminants was assessed using the estimated daily intake (EDI). The Hazard index (HI) and the incremental lifetime cancer risk (ILCR) were determined to define the non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic risk from contaminants, respectively. The potency of liver cancer cases in Uganda was 1.02E-5 and 1.05E-5 adults/year/100,000, and 6.50E-4 and 6.72E-5 ...

African Crop Science Journal, 2014

Extrusion cooking is a modern high-temperature short-time (HTST) processing technology, which is ... more Extrusion cooking is a modern high-temperature short-time (HTST) processing technology, which is becoming popular in certain industries because it offers several advantages over other types of cooking processes. The objective of this study was to evaluate the extrusion performance of sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) varieties commonly grown in Uganda. Four varieties of sorghum namely, Seso1, Epuripur, Seso3 and Eyera were extruded with and without defatted soy-flour. Physical-chemical properties of the extrudates including, lateral expansion, bulk density, hardness, water absorption index, water solubility index, as well as proximate composition were determined. The extrudates exhibited 240-300% lateral expansion and 0.067-0.095 g cm-3 bulk density. The water absorption index was 6.4-7.9 g g-1 compared to 1.9-2.3 g g-1 of the control; while the water solubility index was 6.5-13% compared to 3.4-5.0%% of the control. Extrusion of all the varieties reduced the peak and final viscosity of the...

African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development, 2019

Jackfruit originated from East Asia, known to be the largest tree born fruit weighs up to 30kg an... more Jackfruit originated from East Asia, known to be the largest tree born fruit weighs up to 30kg and yields 50-80 tons per hectare annually. The fruit has large potential in Uganda and has been used in value added products on a small and rudimentary scale. This work assessed the production and utilization patterns of jackfruit with a view of determining its capacity to sustain industrial scale processing. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in jackfruit producing regions from April to June 2016. The study variables were household farm size, number of jackfruit trees, types, utilization methods and constraints associated with jackfruit production. A purposive sampling design was used to select districts, sub-counties, parishes and villages to participate in the survey. A total of 400 household heads from the study area were interviewed using a semi structured questionnaire. Responses and observations were recorded; secondary data was also reviewed for information on the total number of households in a district. The results showed that 32% of the respondents worked on 1-2 acres of farmland on which they have at least 2-7 jackfruit trees. About 57% of jackfruit trees were planted while the remaining 43% were inherited. The study area was estimated to have about 1.7 million fruiting jackfruit trees with the number of fruits per tree varying between 20-120 fruits and weighing11 kg, on average. Jackfruit harvest season in Uganda has two peaks in March to April and November to December, with the latter season yielding more fruit. Jackfruit is categorized into white, orange and yellow types based on the pulp color, hard or soft according to pulp texture. About 78% of households produced jack fruit mainly for home consumption, 16% of the households sold the fruit, and 6% fed it to animals while 1% of the household processed them into dried chips or jackfruit wine. The estimated jackfruit production per district in the study area was 0.3 million metric tons/annum. Although the study area has a potential of producing jackfruit for industrial processing, there is need to grow more jackfruit in an organized manner to meet the increasing and competing demands for both home consumption and industrial processing.

International Journal of Food Science

Drying processes including solar, oven, and refractance window were studied to determine their in... more Drying processes including solar, oven, and refractance window were studied to determine their influence on the drying behavior of jackfruit slices and properties of resultant jackfruit powders. The loss of sample mass, converted to the ratio between the water content at time t and the initial water content (moisture ratio), was used as the experimental parameter for modelling drying processes. Fifteen thin layer drying models were fitted to the experimental data using nonlinear regression analysis. Based on the highest R 2 and lowest SEE values, the models that best fit the observed data were Modified Henderson and Pabis, Verma et al., and Hii et al. for RWD, oven, and solar drying, respectively. The effective moisture diffusivity coefficients were 5.11 × 10 − 9 , 3.28 × 10 − 10 , and 2.55 × 10 − 10 for RWD, oven and, solar drying, respectively. The solubility of freeze-dried jackfruit powder (75.7%) was not significantly different from the refractance window dried powder (73.2%) a...

African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development, 2012

Four types of Obushera, a fermented millet or sorghum beverage: Ekitiribita, Obuteire, Obutoko an... more Four types of Obushera, a fermented millet or sorghum beverage: Ekitiribita, Obuteire, Obutoko and Enturire were analyzed for their physico-chemical properties, sugars, organic acids and volatile compounds during fermentation. Standard chemical methods were used to determine the physico-chemical properties of Obushera. The organic acids, carbohydrates, glucose, fructose and maltose were analyzed by highperformance liquid chromatography. The pH of all Obushera varied between 4.00±0.10 and 4.42±0.11 after 4 days of fermentation. The pH of Obuteire, Obutoko and Enturire dropped below 4.5 within one day of fermentation. Acidity ranged between 0.13% (Ekitiribita) to 1.33% (Enturire) after 4 days of fermentation. Dry matter decreased and varied between 5.4 and 22% after 4 days of fermentation. Fermentation resulted into a 20–40% reduction of dry matter in Obutoko, Obuteire and Enturire. Enturire had the highest dry matter content and decreased from 22% to 13%. Fermentation resulted in an ...

Molecules

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a complex metabolic disorder of glucose homeostasis associated... more Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a complex metabolic disorder of glucose homeostasis associated with a status of insulin resistance, impaired insulin signaling, β-cell dysfunction, impaired glucose and lipid metabolism, sub-clinical inflammation, and increased oxidative stress. Consuming fruits and vegetables rich in phytochemicals with potential antidiabetic effects may prevent T2DM and/or support a conservative T2DM treatment while being safer and more affordable for people from low-income countries. Solanum anguivi Lam. fruits (SALF) have been suggested to exhibit antidiabetic properties, potentially due to the presence of various phytochemicals, including saponins, phenolics, alkaloids, ascorbic acid, and flavonoids. For the saponin fraction, antidiabetic effects have already been reported. However, it remains unclear whether this is also true for the other phytochemicals present in SALF. This review article covers information on glucose homeostasis, T2DM pathogenesis, and als...

International Journal Of Scientific Advances, 2021

Food control defines activities, along the food supply chain, that provide consumer protection an... more Food control defines activities, along the food supply chain, that provide consumer protection and ensure that all foods provided for human consumption are wholesome, conform to safety and quality requirements, and are accurately labelled as prescribed by law. This review analysed the capacity and performance of the existing food control system in Uganda, with specific focus on the rice value chain. This study targeted food safety laws, regulations and agreements to which Uganda is signatory for gaps in, and opportunities for improvement of food control along the rice value chain. The operational components of a food control system including inspection, testing, certification, enforcement, and surveillance controls along the rice value chain were investigated. The analysis established there is a significant threat to food safety due to outdated laws, uncoordinated regulatory framework, overlapping mandates, limited testing capacity, inadequate human resource, limited awareness of co...

Abstract: Edible films can be produced from kafirin but the diverse food product requirements nec... more Abstract: Edible films can be produced from kafirin but the diverse food product requirements necessitate modification of the films. To modify their functional properties, kafirin films were cast, with and without plasticizer, from glacial acetic acid (GAA) and aqueous ethanol (AE), then heated using microwave energy. A power of 80W for 2min caused an approximately two- and fourfold increase in the tensile strength of non-plasticized and plasticized films, respectively. Film glass transition temperature increased by about 15%. Film biodegradability was slowed. However, only the digestibility of the non-plasticized films cast from AE heated for the longest time (4min) was decreased, by about 25%; while that of the other films was not affected. GAA cast films had higher digestibility than AE cast ones, possibly as a result of acid-mediated deamidation of kafirin. Sodium dodecyl sulfate–polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis indicated heat-induced kafirin oligomers. Scanning electron micro...

Food Science & Nutrition, 2021

Tube systems are widely used in heat transfer and intensive research is being done on positioning... more Tube systems are widely used in heat transfer and intensive research is being done on positioning tubes on a platform. The platform structure is constantly exposed to thermal changes under operating conditions and the resulting stresses cause damage to existing systems. In this study, 8 thin-walled tubes were positioned on flat and curved platforms that were widely used and the stress behavior under thermal effects was investigated. Finite element analysis was used, and steadystate thermal condition was considered in the numerical investigation. The effects of temperature difference between platform surfaces and the thermal conductivity at the tube surfaces were investigated. It has been determined that the stress on the platform is higher than the stress on the tubes and the increase in the temperature difference on the platform surfaces increases the stress drastically. The increased thermal conductivity coefficient on the tube surface reduced the stresses on the platform and increased fatigue performance. Flat platform has lower contact pressure and platform stresses and better fatigue behavior. Results are discussed in detail.

Purpose: Transformation of pumpkin flesh and seeds into dry flours increases their shelf stabilit... more Purpose: Transformation of pumpkin flesh and seeds into dry flours increases their shelf stability and versatility. This study sought to optimise drying conditions for production of flour with high nutritional and nutraceutical value from flesh and seeds of C. pepo L var. fastigata using Response Surface Methodology, I optimal design. Research Method: Pumpkin flesh and seeds were dried following temperature time combinations got using I optimal design. All dry samples were tested for ascorbic acid, total carotenoids, total antioxidant capacity and starch digestibility. Seeds were also tested for in vitro protein digestibility, trypsin inhibitor activity, alpha tocopherol, beta tocopherol, and alpha tocotrienol. Findings: The predicted optimum drying conditions for production of C. pepo L var. fastigata flour with maximum nutritional quality and bioactivity were 57°C; 6.9 hours for flesh and 60°C; 3.15 hours for seeds. The most influential model terms were temperature for resistant s...

2015 ASABE International Meeting, 2015

This paper evaluated the performance of a locally fabricated sawdust fired oven for drying proces... more This paper evaluated the performance of a locally fabricated sawdust fired oven for drying process. The principles of energy conservation and heat recovery were applied in analyzing the data obtained from the pilot Oven. Results obtained revealed that the maximum oven temperature in the drying chamber was 130 0 C after 105 minutes of the heating process. Furthermore, the maximum energy gained and efficiency computed were 3.78kW and 56.65% respectively. Thus, using the sawdust fired Oven for domestic drying purpose will reduce dependence on fossil fuel; therefore, minimizing the effect of global warming and climate change. The used of the sawdust oven can serve as an alternative device for burning sawdust for drying purpose.

Journal of Nutrition & Food Sciences, 2013

Provision of nutritionally adequate foods is crucial for the prevention and management of malnutr... more Provision of nutritionally adequate foods is crucial for the prevention and management of malnutrition. In order to meet the nutrient requirements of infants and young children using locally available cereals and legumes, foods need to be of low viscosity, of high caloric content and nutrient density and easily digestible. This study developed a processing protocol for three plant food formulations to yield nutrient dense, easily digestible and safe therapeutic foods for malnourished children. Pre-digestion of the milled ingredients at 40°C for 4 hours with grain amaranth that was malted for 48 hours and 1% Bromelain achieved 70-84% starch hydrolysis and 55-61% protein hydrolysis. Sterilization of the therapeutic food in glass jars in an autoclave at 121°C, 15 PSI for 20 minutesgave non-detectable total plate and yeast and mold counts. The final products had viscosities of 2745-2913 Cps. These results show that pre-digestion can improve the nutrition quality of infant foods made from plant sources.

Food ScienTech Journal

Increased commercialization of indigenous fermented foods requires availability of affordable sta... more Increased commercialization of indigenous fermented foods requires availability of affordable starter cultures. The starters should also maintain functionality when stored at ambient conditions, especially where erratic power supply makes constant refrigeration unachievable. This study evaluated the survival of Lactobacillus plantarum MNC 21 starter culture air-dried (at 25 or 30°C) in sorghum flour and stored at 25°C for 30 days. Two sorghum varieties (malted and un-malted) were used. To determine their fermentation efficiency during storage, sterile sorghum malt slurries were inoculated with the dried culture and fermented at 30°C for 24 h. Acidification potential was determined at 5 days intervals by measuring microbial counts, pH and titratable acidity. Microbial concentrations dropped from 8-9 log cfu/g on day 0 to 1 log cfu/g on day 30. Sorghum variety and whether it was malted or un-malted did not affect culture survival. Culture dried at 25C had better survival during the first 10 days (8-9 log cfu/g) than that dried at 30C (8 log cfu/g) but survival between days 20-30 was similar (1-4 log cfu/g). The acidification potential (ability to reduce pH to ≤4.5) decreased with storage time: 4 h (day 0), 24 h (day 15), > 24 h (day 20) to no acidification (days 25-30). Air drying of starter cultures in sorghum flours coupled with storage at ambient temperatures could be adopted as a short-term preservation method. This low-cost technology is suitable for processors in developing countries where maintenance of a cold chain is hampered by unreliable electricity supply.

African eggplant (Solanum anguivi Lam.) fruits reportedly exhibit antidiabetic properties, possib... more African eggplant (Solanum anguivi Lam.) fruits reportedly exhibit antidiabetic properties, possibly due to the presence of bioactive compounds. This study aimed to assess the bioactive compounds content (BCC) and antioxidant activity (AA) in the fruits of fourteen African eggplant accessions. The relationship between the fruit BCC and AA, and the plant (leaf, stem and fruit) morphological characteristics was determined. Morphological traits for the plant accessions were characterized based on existing Solanum species descriptors. Total phenolics, flavonoids, saponins, vitamin C and AA were determined by spectrophotometry, while total alkaloids were detected by gravimetry. HPLC was used for the quantification of phenolic compounds. Morphological characteristics, BCC and AA differed among the accessions. The fruit's accessions contained total phenolics (8.0-12.4 mg gallic acid equivalent/g dry weight (DW)), saponins (51.1-124.8 mg diosgenin equivalent/g DW), alkaloids (81.4-127.7 ...

International Journal Of Scientific Advances, 2021

Previous studies have reported the presence of aflatoxins (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2), heavy meta... more Previous studies have reported the presence of aflatoxins (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2), heavy metals (As, Cd and Pb) and organochlorine pesticide residues (OCPs) in rice sold in Uganda. However, the potential health effects associated with consumption of rice have not been evaluated. The aim of this study was to evaluate the health risk of consuming rice sold in Uganda. A total of 45 packed and 30 open traded rice samples were randomly collected from retail outlets in the main rice trading areas of Uganda. Rice was analysed for AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2, As, Cd, Pb and OCPs using AOAC standard methods. Dietary exposure of the consumers to contaminants was assessed using the estimated daily intake (EDI). The Hazard index (HI) and the incremental lifetime cancer risk (ILCR) were determined to define the non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic risk from contaminants, respectively. The potency of liver cancer cases in Uganda was 1.02E-5 and 1.05E-5 adults/year/100,000, and 6.50E-4 and 6.72E-5 ...

African Crop Science Journal, 2014

Extrusion cooking is a modern high-temperature short-time (HTST) processing technology, which is ... more Extrusion cooking is a modern high-temperature short-time (HTST) processing technology, which is becoming popular in certain industries because it offers several advantages over other types of cooking processes. The objective of this study was to evaluate the extrusion performance of sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) varieties commonly grown in Uganda. Four varieties of sorghum namely, Seso1, Epuripur, Seso3 and Eyera were extruded with and without defatted soy-flour. Physical-chemical properties of the extrudates including, lateral expansion, bulk density, hardness, water absorption index, water solubility index, as well as proximate composition were determined. The extrudates exhibited 240-300% lateral expansion and 0.067-0.095 g cm-3 bulk density. The water absorption index was 6.4-7.9 g g-1 compared to 1.9-2.3 g g-1 of the control; while the water solubility index was 6.5-13% compared to 3.4-5.0%% of the control. Extrusion of all the varieties reduced the peak and final viscosity of the...

African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development, 2019

Jackfruit originated from East Asia, known to be the largest tree born fruit weighs up to 30kg an... more Jackfruit originated from East Asia, known to be the largest tree born fruit weighs up to 30kg and yields 50-80 tons per hectare annually. The fruit has large potential in Uganda and has been used in value added products on a small and rudimentary scale. This work assessed the production and utilization patterns of jackfruit with a view of determining its capacity to sustain industrial scale processing. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in jackfruit producing regions from April to June 2016. The study variables were household farm size, number of jackfruit trees, types, utilization methods and constraints associated with jackfruit production. A purposive sampling design was used to select districts, sub-counties, parishes and villages to participate in the survey. A total of 400 household heads from the study area were interviewed using a semi structured questionnaire. Responses and observations were recorded; secondary data was also reviewed for information on the total number of households in a district. The results showed that 32% of the respondents worked on 1-2 acres of farmland on which they have at least 2-7 jackfruit trees. About 57% of jackfruit trees were planted while the remaining 43% were inherited. The study area was estimated to have about 1.7 million fruiting jackfruit trees with the number of fruits per tree varying between 20-120 fruits and weighing11 kg, on average. Jackfruit harvest season in Uganda has two peaks in March to April and November to December, with the latter season yielding more fruit. Jackfruit is categorized into white, orange and yellow types based on the pulp color, hard or soft according to pulp texture. About 78% of households produced jack fruit mainly for home consumption, 16% of the households sold the fruit, and 6% fed it to animals while 1% of the household processed them into dried chips or jackfruit wine. The estimated jackfruit production per district in the study area was 0.3 million metric tons/annum. Although the study area has a potential of producing jackfruit for industrial processing, there is need to grow more jackfruit in an organized manner to meet the increasing and competing demands for both home consumption and industrial processing.

International Journal of Food Science

Drying processes including solar, oven, and refractance window were studied to determine their in... more Drying processes including solar, oven, and refractance window were studied to determine their influence on the drying behavior of jackfruit slices and properties of resultant jackfruit powders. The loss of sample mass, converted to the ratio between the water content at time t and the initial water content (moisture ratio), was used as the experimental parameter for modelling drying processes. Fifteen thin layer drying models were fitted to the experimental data using nonlinear regression analysis. Based on the highest R 2 and lowest SEE values, the models that best fit the observed data were Modified Henderson and Pabis, Verma et al., and Hii et al. for RWD, oven, and solar drying, respectively. The effective moisture diffusivity coefficients were 5.11 × 10 − 9 , 3.28 × 10 − 10 , and 2.55 × 10 − 10 for RWD, oven and, solar drying, respectively. The solubility of freeze-dried jackfruit powder (75.7%) was not significantly different from the refractance window dried powder (73.2%) a...

African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development, 2012

Four types of Obushera, a fermented millet or sorghum beverage: Ekitiribita, Obuteire, Obutoko an... more Four types of Obushera, a fermented millet or sorghum beverage: Ekitiribita, Obuteire, Obutoko and Enturire were analyzed for their physico-chemical properties, sugars, organic acids and volatile compounds during fermentation. Standard chemical methods were used to determine the physico-chemical properties of Obushera. The organic acids, carbohydrates, glucose, fructose and maltose were analyzed by highperformance liquid chromatography. The pH of all Obushera varied between 4.00±0.10 and 4.42±0.11 after 4 days of fermentation. The pH of Obuteire, Obutoko and Enturire dropped below 4.5 within one day of fermentation. Acidity ranged between 0.13% (Ekitiribita) to 1.33% (Enturire) after 4 days of fermentation. Dry matter decreased and varied between 5.4 and 22% after 4 days of fermentation. Fermentation resulted into a 20–40% reduction of dry matter in Obutoko, Obuteire and Enturire. Enturire had the highest dry matter content and decreased from 22% to 13%. Fermentation resulted in an ...

Molecules

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a complex metabolic disorder of glucose homeostasis associated... more Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a complex metabolic disorder of glucose homeostasis associated with a status of insulin resistance, impaired insulin signaling, β-cell dysfunction, impaired glucose and lipid metabolism, sub-clinical inflammation, and increased oxidative stress. Consuming fruits and vegetables rich in phytochemicals with potential antidiabetic effects may prevent T2DM and/or support a conservative T2DM treatment while being safer and more affordable for people from low-income countries. Solanum anguivi Lam. fruits (SALF) have been suggested to exhibit antidiabetic properties, potentially due to the presence of various phytochemicals, including saponins, phenolics, alkaloids, ascorbic acid, and flavonoids. For the saponin fraction, antidiabetic effects have already been reported. However, it remains unclear whether this is also true for the other phytochemicals present in SALF. This review article covers information on glucose homeostasis, T2DM pathogenesis, and als...

International Journal Of Scientific Advances, 2021

Food control defines activities, along the food supply chain, that provide consumer protection an... more Food control defines activities, along the food supply chain, that provide consumer protection and ensure that all foods provided for human consumption are wholesome, conform to safety and quality requirements, and are accurately labelled as prescribed by law. This review analysed the capacity and performance of the existing food control system in Uganda, with specific focus on the rice value chain. This study targeted food safety laws, regulations and agreements to which Uganda is signatory for gaps in, and opportunities for improvement of food control along the rice value chain. The operational components of a food control system including inspection, testing, certification, enforcement, and surveillance controls along the rice value chain were investigated. The analysis established there is a significant threat to food safety due to outdated laws, uncoordinated regulatory framework, overlapping mandates, limited testing capacity, inadequate human resource, limited awareness of co...

Abstract: Edible films can be produced from kafirin but the diverse food product requirements nec... more Abstract: Edible films can be produced from kafirin but the diverse food product requirements necessitate modification of the films. To modify their functional properties, kafirin films were cast, with and without plasticizer, from glacial acetic acid (GAA) and aqueous ethanol (AE), then heated using microwave energy. A power of 80W for 2min caused an approximately two- and fourfold increase in the tensile strength of non-plasticized and plasticized films, respectively. Film glass transition temperature increased by about 15%. Film biodegradability was slowed. However, only the digestibility of the non-plasticized films cast from AE heated for the longest time (4min) was decreased, by about 25%; while that of the other films was not affected. GAA cast films had higher digestibility than AE cast ones, possibly as a result of acid-mediated deamidation of kafirin. Sodium dodecyl sulfate–polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis indicated heat-induced kafirin oligomers. Scanning electron micro...

Food Science & Nutrition, 2021

Tube systems are widely used in heat transfer and intensive research is being done on positioning... more Tube systems are widely used in heat transfer and intensive research is being done on positioning tubes on a platform. The platform structure is constantly exposed to thermal changes under operating conditions and the resulting stresses cause damage to existing systems. In this study, 8 thin-walled tubes were positioned on flat and curved platforms that were widely used and the stress behavior under thermal effects was investigated. Finite element analysis was used, and steadystate thermal condition was considered in the numerical investigation. The effects of temperature difference between platform surfaces and the thermal conductivity at the tube surfaces were investigated. It has been determined that the stress on the platform is higher than the stress on the tubes and the increase in the temperature difference on the platform surfaces increases the stress drastically. The increased thermal conductivity coefficient on the tube surface reduced the stresses on the platform and increased fatigue performance. Flat platform has lower contact pressure and platform stresses and better fatigue behavior. Results are discussed in detail.

Purpose: Transformation of pumpkin flesh and seeds into dry flours increases their shelf stabilit... more Purpose: Transformation of pumpkin flesh and seeds into dry flours increases their shelf stability and versatility. This study sought to optimise drying conditions for production of flour with high nutritional and nutraceutical value from flesh and seeds of C. pepo L var. fastigata using Response Surface Methodology, I optimal design. Research Method: Pumpkin flesh and seeds were dried following temperature time combinations got using I optimal design. All dry samples were tested for ascorbic acid, total carotenoids, total antioxidant capacity and starch digestibility. Seeds were also tested for in vitro protein digestibility, trypsin inhibitor activity, alpha tocopherol, beta tocopherol, and alpha tocotrienol. Findings: The predicted optimum drying conditions for production of C. pepo L var. fastigata flour with maximum nutritional quality and bioactivity were 57°C; 6.9 hours for flesh and 60°C; 3.15 hours for seeds. The most influential model terms were temperature for resistant s...

2015 ASABE International Meeting, 2015

This paper evaluated the performance of a locally fabricated sawdust fired oven for drying proces... more This paper evaluated the performance of a locally fabricated sawdust fired oven for drying process. The principles of energy conservation and heat recovery were applied in analyzing the data obtained from the pilot Oven. Results obtained revealed that the maximum oven temperature in the drying chamber was 130 0 C after 105 minutes of the heating process. Furthermore, the maximum energy gained and efficiency computed were 3.78kW and 56.65% respectively. Thus, using the sawdust fired Oven for domestic drying purpose will reduce dependence on fossil fuel; therefore, minimizing the effect of global warming and climate change. The used of the sawdust oven can serve as an alternative device for burning sawdust for drying purpose.

Journal of Nutrition & Food Sciences, 2013

Provision of nutritionally adequate foods is crucial for the prevention and management of malnutr... more Provision of nutritionally adequate foods is crucial for the prevention and management of malnutrition. In order to meet the nutrient requirements of infants and young children using locally available cereals and legumes, foods need to be of low viscosity, of high caloric content and nutrient density and easily digestible. This study developed a processing protocol for three plant food formulations to yield nutrient dense, easily digestible and safe therapeutic foods for malnourished children. Pre-digestion of the milled ingredients at 40°C for 4 hours with grain amaranth that was malted for 48 hours and 1% Bromelain achieved 70-84% starch hydrolysis and 55-61% protein hydrolysis. Sterilization of the therapeutic food in glass jars in an autoclave at 121°C, 15 PSI for 20 minutesgave non-detectable total plate and yeast and mold counts. The final products had viscosities of 2745-2913 Cps. These results show that pre-digestion can improve the nutrition quality of infant foods made from plant sources.