Membrane for processing tropical fruit juice

In the present work, membrane processing was investigated in order to clarify and to recover aroma from tropical fruit juices. Pineapple and passion fruit juices were selected. Pervaporation experiments were also carried out with binary synthetic aqueous solutions of typical aroma components. Experimental and simulation results indicated that olefin pervaporation membranes presented a good performance due to its low water permeability and high enrichment factor to the components of aroma from the investigated synthetic solutions, as well as the single strength and the clarified fruit juices.

Evaluation of different membrane materials with typical tropical fruit aroma components shows that when the organic solute concentration is reduced in the feed, as occurred in the clarification, it is advantageous to choose a more selective polymer. On the other hand, if the aroma concentration is high enough in the feed, phase separation may occur in the permeate after its condensation. In this case, the simulation results indicate that it is advantageous to use more permeable membranes.