Computational Techniques on Freeze Drying

Freeze drying (FD) is a conventional technique that produces a unique monolith structure by removing moisture from the food products through a sublimation phase. This traditional method has an enormous potential application in high-value-added products because of its comparative superiority over other methodologies in shape stability, product quality, volatile substance retention, and bioactive compounds. Comparatively, FD stands out in product attributes despite the cost and complexity involved. This chapter outlines the principles, a brief overview of the technology, significant process parameters, and quality aspects of food products in the form of computational governing equations in 2D and 3D axisymmetric space. It also emphasizes recent developments in this drying with computational and mathematical modelling to analyse the water vapour flows. It also improves product quality with time variation models, partial pressure of water vapour, temperature, and concentration of sorbed water. An arbitrary Lagranagian-Eulerian model in the sublimation phase for FD under continuous gas conditions was also allowed using the solution of the Navier-Stokes equation. In addition, the advantages, limitations, and future scope for research in the field of FD, with an importance on the effectiveness of CFD for improvement in design and experimentation, were also discussed, along with suitable examples.