Influence of Moisture Content on Germination and Physico-Mechanical Properties of Pulses

Abstract

Background: Pulses are a kind of legume crops which can be utilised for both food and animal feed. Pulses are also termed a “poor man’s meat” because of high protein content. The physical properties of pulses are useful to design the processing equipment. The moisture content of agricultural materials greatly affects various physical properties. Nitty-gritty data on germination and physico-mechanical properties of pulses are provided in this paper at different moisture contents, which is extremely helpful in the design of equipment used in harvesting operations and food processing operations. Methods: The experiment was conducted at Department of Agricultural Engineering, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. All the experiments were replicated thrice and mean±SD (standard deviation) values were taken using R software to check the level of significance (p£0.05). Result: Physical properties, mechanical properties and germination of pulses were evaluated as functions of moisture content. It was observed that average length, breadth, thickness and geometric mean diameter, sphericity, porosity, angle of repose and static coefficient of friction of pulses increased linearly and bulk density, true density, hardness and germination decreased density with increase in moisture content from 9.98 to 20.4% (db).