Determination of accurate viscoelastic and mechanical properties of fruit and vegetables (FV) is essential not only for designing appropriate equipment for harvesting, transporting, sorting and storing but also to determine the most appropriate process parameters in any food processing operation. Traditionally, classical models are used to determine these properties, which require many parameters and therefore deemed complex and computationally expensive. Moreover, many of these properties are not available in the literature. In this research, a comprehensive experimental investigation has been carried out to determine some rheological and mechanical properties such as relaxation modulus, apparent modulus, Poisson's ratio and Lame's coefficient of eight different fruit and vegetables using both classical and fractional viscoelastic models. The Caputo Fractional Rheological Model was found to be the better model than the classical models for determining viscoelastic properties as the single element fractional model was found to be sufficient to predict the viscoelastic properties with fewer parameters compared with the three elements classical model. A database of the mechanical properties of different fruit and vegetables have been presented. A relationship between the viscoelastic properties and the porosity has been established. It was also found that the Poisson's ratio of the fruit and vegetables widely varied with changing loading rates.

中文翻译：

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Caputo分数流变模型在果蔬粘弹性力学特性测定中的应用

准确测定水果和蔬菜 (FV) 的粘弹性和机械特性不仅对于设计合适的收获、运输、分类和储存设备至关重要，而且对于确定任何食品加工操作中最合适的工艺参数也至关重要。传统上，经典模型用于确定这些属性，这需要许多参数，因此被认为复杂且计算成本高。此外，许多这些特性在文献中是不可用的。在这项研究中，使用经典和分数粘弹性模型进行了全面的实验研究，以确定八种不同水果和蔬菜的一些流变和机械特性，例如松弛模量、表观模量、泊松比和拉姆系数。发现 Caputo 分数流变模型是比经典模型更好的模型，用于确定粘弹性，因为与三元素经典模型相比，发现单元素分数模型足以用更少的参数预测粘弹性。已经提供了不同水果和蔬菜的机械特性的数据库。粘弹性和孔隙率之间的关系已经建立。还发现水果和蔬菜的泊松比随着装载率的变化而变化很大。