Food Powder Flow in Extrusion: Role of Particle Size and Composition

Innovations in food extrusion technology are enabling its rapid expansion and applicability in diverse areas related to bioprocessing and value addition. This study relates raw material particulate rheology to the granular flow in a single screw food extruder. Raw materials based on corn (i.e., meal, flour, and starch), wheat (i.e., farina, flour, and starch), and sucrose (i.e., granulated, superfine, and powdered) were used as model particulate systems for the study. Various particulate-scale characteristics and flow parameters of these nine materials were determined using a powder rheometer, a promising new offline tool. Properties such as basic flow energy, specific energy, cohesion, stability index, flow function, and effective angle of internal friction were good indicators of flowability in an extruder. Corn meal exhibited lower energy requirements and a higher propensity for flow than corn flour (6.7 mJ/g versus 10.7 mJ/g, and &ldquo:free-flowing&rdquo: versus &ldquo:cohesive,&rdquo: according to Flow Function classifications), with wheat farina showing similar results when compared to wheat flour (5.8 mJ/g versus 7.9 mJ/g, and &ldquo:highly free-flowing versus &ldquo:cohesive,&rdquo: according to Flow Function classifications), although both wheat systems showed comparatively lower energy requirements than their comparable corn systems. Sugar, being of a different base material and particle shape, behaved differently than these starch-based materials&mdash:flow energy decreased and propensity to flow increased (51.7 mJ/g versus 8.0 mJ/g, and &ldquo:free-flowing&rdquo: versus &ldquo:highly free-flowing&rdquo:). This large energy requirement for coarse sugar particles may be attributed more to particle shape than composition, as the sharp edges of sugar can interlock and increase restriction to movement through the sample. The starch-based results were validated in a particulate flow study involving the above model systems (corn meal, corn flour, wheat farina, and wheat flour) in a pilot-scale single screw extruder. Visualization data, obtained using a transparent plexiglass window during extrusion, confirmed that the flours exhibited higher flow energy requirements and a lower flow factor when compared to the coarser-particle size corn meal during extrusion, seen by the increased peak heights and barrel fill.