Chileans create technology to extract juice from berries without using high temperatures
Photography: University of Talca
An innovation that solves two important issues: not alter the properties of the fruit when subjected to high temperatures, and of course, avoid waste.
It is a system proposed by a mechanical engineering student, Sebastián Gonzáles and academic Carlos Zambra of engineering.
It is an innovative alternative that allows the extraction of juices of berries without the need to subject the fruit to high temperatures, which always ends up reducing the properties and nutritional value.
The idea -which is already designed and prototyped on a small scale- consists of a system that, through the use of membranes, concentrates the juices of raspberries or other berries, informed the University of Talca.
"This juice has a competitive advantage over those that are now marketed, since it has all the nutritional properties found in natural fruit. We hope at some point to be able to market the juice or the machine that can be built on an industrial scale"Explained the student.
The project that forms part of Sebastian González's grade memory earned him the award of financing through Conicyt's University Research Valorization (VIU) contest, which aims to encourage good ideas to become businesses.
"We are looking to develop projects like this that are tangible and that are not only in theory, but end with an instrument or machine that can produce something, in this case the juice of berries", Concluded Carlos Zambra.
As we mentioned at the beginning, this technology offers benefits such as avoiding waste by taking advantage of the raw materials that are generated in areas of berry production, since the fruit sometimes can not be exported, being discarded by the producers.
"This machine optimizes resources and can also be manufactured by us, which allows its cost to be low in relation to imported equipment"Said Gonzalez.
The process that prevents the loss of properties is called osmotic distillation, so the result is fruit of great nutritional value transformed into juice.
Source: Portal del Campo
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