Interrogating the mechanical origin of the sensory texture of plant foods

• Main Author: Tan, Cassius Shinn Han
• Other Authors: Huang Changjin
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2021
• Subjects: Engineering::Aeronautical engineering
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/153690
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

This project investigates the relationship between the mechanical properties and sensory textures of plant foods. The mechanical properties selected were the Young’s modulus, maximum stress before collapse as well as the maximum strain before collapse. These mechanical properties were extracted from stress-strain curves which were in turn obtained via compression testing done on selected plant foods. On this point, the mechanical properties were compared between plant foods belonging to two textural groups - crunchy (China celery, Fuji apple, Malaysian baby cucumber) and mushy (Malaysian honeydew, Packham pear, Spain donut peach). From the results, the crunchy plant foods exhibited a higher modulus as well as a higher maximum stress before collapse as compared to the mushy plant foods. No conclusive results were obtained in terms of the maximum strain before collapse between the crunchy and mushy plant foods. Additionally, this project provides several secondary findings such as the effects of anisotropy, presence of the outer skin layer as well as varying compression loading rates on the mechanical properties of plant foods.