See

discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/222794931

Measurement of thermal conductivity of dairy

products

Article in Journal of Food Engineering August 1999

DOI: 10.1016/S0260-8774(99)00079-5

CITATIONS READS

40 2,203

2 authors:

Ismail H. Tavman Sebnem Tavman

Dokuz Eylul University Ege University
83 PUBLICATIONS 1,482 CITATIONS 65 PUBLICATIONS 542 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

TUBITAK 214O405 View project

thermophysical properties of carbon nanotube filled polymer composites View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Ismail H. Tavman on 10 October 2017.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 Journal of Food Engineering 41 (1999) 109114
www.elsevier.com/locate/jfoodeng

Measurement of thermal conductivity of dairy products

I.H. Tavman a,*, S. Tavman b
a
Dokuz Eyl
ul University, Mechanical Engineering Department, 35100 Bornova, Izmir, Turkey
b
Ege University, Food Engineering Department, 35100 Bornova, Izmir, Turkey
Received 14 July 1997; received in revised form 31 March 1999; accepted 2 April 1999

Abstract
Thermal conductivity of eleven kinds of cheese, four kinds of yogurt and a butter sample has been measured at about 15C and
30C. A modied hot wire method was used for thermal conductivity measurements. The eect of the water, fat and protein content
on the thermal conductivity has been investigated, the measured thermal conductivity values were linearly dependent on water
content, and inversely dependent on fat and protein contents of the various dairy products. A slight increase in the thermal con-
ductivity with temperature has been noticed for four cheese samples studied over a wider range of temperature, between 4C and
44C. 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction water content and temperature was observed. Leiden-

During processing, all dairy products are heated and
cooled. In order to analyze accurately the rate and
amount of heat transfer involved, thermal properties of
the products being processed must be known. There are
many factors which may aect the thermal conductivity
of foods and food products, e.g., composition, density,
porosity, product temperature, heat treatment and other
details of the particular substance. There is a great need
for thermal conductivity values of dairy products for
processing, preservation and production. The measure-
ment of thermal conductivity of every type of product
under every conceivable condition would be an enor-
mous task, therefore the use of models to predict ther-
mal conductivity using other more easily measured
properties, such as water content, fat content or density,
appears to be the best way to assure the availability of
data. Before such models can be generated, considerable
data must be collected.
Many thermal conductivity values are available for
liquid dairy products in the literature, but very few
values are encountered for non-liquid dairy products
such as cheese and butter. Reidel (1949) measured
thermal conductivity of whole milk, skimmed milk,
evaporated milk and whey at temperatures varying from
2C to 80C. An increase of thermal conductivity with
*
Corresponding author. Tel.: +90-232-388-3138; fax: +90-232-388-
7864; e-mail: tavman@textil.ege.edu.tr
0260-8774/99/$ - see front matter 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 2 6 0 - 8 7 7 4 ( 9 9 ) 0 0 0 7 9 - 5
frost (1959) measured the thermal conductivity of the
condensed milk with a steady-state concentric cylinders
method with the sample lling the 1 mm annulus be-
tween the cylinders. The measurements were done at
temperatures varying from 7C to 87C for two kinds of
milk samples, one with 90% moisture, 7% solids, 3% fat
content; the other with 50% moisture, 35% solids, 15%
fat content by weight. The thermal conductivity in-
creased with increasing water content and temperature.
Konrad and Rambke (1971) worked with whole milk,
skim milk and cream at dierent concentrations. A
study by Fernandez-Martin and Montes (1972) included
skim milk, half and half milk (10% fat, 10% solids not
fat) and whole milk at various concentrations and
temperatures from 5C to 75C. Equations were devel-
oped to express thermal conductivity as a function of fat
content, solids-not-fat-content, temperature and the ra-
tio of fat to solids-not-fat. Artecka, Gogol, Gogol and
Staniszewski (1974) reported the variation of thermal
conductivity of milk margarine (q 925 kg/m3 ) with
temperature, between 24C and 22C. The thermal
conductivity values are in the range 0.2200.235 W/m K,
the minimum being at 0C. Sweat and Parmelee (1978)
used a line heat source probe to measure the thermal
conductivity of 28 dairy products and margarines at
0C, 20C and 40C. The water content of the products
studied ranged from 16.0% to 82.2% by weight, and the
fat content ranged from 5.6% to 81.7% by weight, the
thermal conductivity values ranged from 0.15 W/m K
110 I.H. Tavman, S. Tavman / Journal of Food Engineering 41 (1999) 109114
for whipped margarine at 0C to 0.54 W/m K for pud-
ding at 40C. A linear increase of thermal conductivity
with water content expressed as percent by weight has
been deduced from the experimental results, with a
correlation coecient of 0.93:
k 0:141 0:00412  Xwater ; 1 component were expressed by models as a function of
whereas, thermal conductivity decreased linearly with
fat content, temperature did not appear to be a signi-
cant factor over the limited temperature range studied.
MacCarthy (1984) measured the eective thermal con-
ductivity of skim milk using a guarded hot plate tech-
nique. Values ranged from 0.036 to 0.0109 W/m K in the
temperature range 11.849.7C for bulk densities be-
tween 292 and 724 kg/m3 . The eective thermal con-
ductivity increased with temperature and with bulk
density. More and Prasad (1988) used a steady-state,
parallel disk, relative method to determine the thermal
conductivity of whole milk at concentrations from 37%
to 72.4% total solids and temperature range between
40C and 90C. The thermal conductivity of milk in-
creased with rise in temperature and decreased with in-
crease in total solids content and its value varied from
0.278 to 0.491 W/m K. In order to predict the thermal
conductivity of milk from temperature and total solids
content, they proposed an expression developed from
the experimental data.
k 0:59 0:0012T 1 0:0078 X ; 2 were studied in this research. The composition of all
where, k is the thermal conductivity of the whole milk, X
its total solids percentage (37 < X < 72) and T the tem-
perature (40 < T < 90C).
In a more recent study, Reddy and Datta (1994) de-
termined the specic heat, thermal conductivity, and
apparent viscosity of milk between concentrations of
40% and 70% and temperatures of 35C and 65C. They
obtained an expression for the thermal conductivity as
functions of temperature and concentration.
Very few data are found in the literature about
thermal conductivity of yogurt. In the context of Cost 90
(collaborative measurements of thermal properties of
foods), thermal conductivity and diusivity of yogurt
supplied by Kennerty Farm Dairies, Aberdeen, UK,
were measured by four dierent laboratories at 6 dif-
ferent temperatures from 1C to 40C. Results of ther-
mal conductivity measurements ranged from 0.525 W/m
K for 1C to an average of 0.603 W/m K for 40C, the
temperature dependence compares well with published
data for pure water (Powell, Ho & Liley, 1966). The
composition of yogurt used in the measurements was as
follows: 86.2% of water, 4.2% of protein, 1.1% of fat,
1.0% of ash, 7.5% of carbohydrate by weight.
Choi and Okos (1986) proposed a general model to
predict thermal conductivity of food products in a
temperature range of 40150C. This model was
based on the volume fraction (Xiv ) and the thermal
conductivity (ki ) of major pure components of food
products:
X
k ki Xiv : 3
Thermal conductivity values of each major pure
temperature. The thermal conductivity values predicted
by the model proposed in this study were within 2.91%
error to the literature values of liquid foods and within
4.54% error to the experimental values determined from
evaporated milk, orange juice and bratwurst sausage.
The objective of this study was to determine experi-
mentally the thermal conductivity values of 16 dierent
dairy products and to relate thermal conductivity to
water content, fat content, protein content and tem-
perature of the sample. Many dierent samples were
tested to broaden the scope of the data.
2. Experimental
2.1. Dairy product samples
All dairy products were supplied by PINAR Dairy
Products Inc., Izmir, Turkey and kept refrigerated at
8C until tested. Thermal conductivities of eleven types
of cheese, four types of yogurt and one type of butter
dairy products tested is given in Table 1, as percent by
weight; the density and pH are given in Table 2. Fat
content of the samples was determined by Gerbers
method, and water content with the oven method.
Protein, carbohydrate and ash contents of the samples
were determined using AOAC (1990) ocial methods of
analysis. It may be noticed that the water content ranges
from 15.11% to 86.81% and the fat content ranges from
0.19% to 83.59% by weight.
2.2. Thermal conductivity measurements
In our experiments, a Shotherm QTM thermal con-
ductivity meter, produced by Showa Denko K.K. and
working with a modied hot wire method, was used for
thermal conductivity measurements of dairy product
samples. A thin straight wire through which a constant
electric current is passed generating constant heat (Q)
per unit length of wire, per unit time, is placed between
two rectangular-shaped materials, (Fig. 1). The rst
block is an insulating material of known thermal prop-
erties which is a part of the measuring probe and the
second block is the sample rectangular in shape of di-
mensions 10 cm length, 5 cm width and 5 cm height
minimum, for which the thermal conductivity has to be
measured. A constant power is supplied to the heater
element and the temperature rise DT of the heating wire
 I.H. Tavman, S. Tavman / Journal of Food Engineering 41 (1999) 109114 111

Table 1
Composition of dairy products used (% by weight)

Product Water Fat Protein Carbohydrate Ash

Butter 15.11 83.59 1.18 0 0.12

Cheddar Cheese 36.00 32.00 25.37 2.56 4.07
Hamburger Cheese 41.00 24.78 20.58 7.80 5.84
Old Kashkaval Cheese 41.00 26.55 26.56 2.01 3.88
Tulum Cheesea 41.00 28.91 24.79 1.54 3.76
Fresh Kashkaval Cheese 43.79 22.75 26.16 4.31 2.99
Mozzarella Cheese 44.35 23.86 26.51 1.96 3.32
Buet Kashkaval Cheese 49.84 14.27 31.97 0.56 3.36
Fresh Cream Cheese 56.32 23.54 7.49 10.07 2.58
Labne 69.13 20.94 5.62 3.32 0.99
Low Fat Labne 74.65 10.25 8.99 4.80 1.31
Spreadable Cheese 60.60 16.25 15.38 3.45 4.32
Strained Yogurt 74.23 7.42 9.59 7.45 1.31
Light Yogurt 81.95 1.55 6.90 8.31 1.29
Pasteurized Yogurt 82.48 4.12 5.66 5.60 2.14
Extra Light Yogurt 86.81 0.19 5.98 6.72 0.30
a
A local cheese made of cows milk.

Table 2
Properties of dairy products used

Product Density (kg/m3 ) pH Total solids content (%)

Butter 942.3 4.52 84.89

Cheddar Cheese 1102.0 5.15 64.00
Hamburger Cheese 1114.0 5.60 59.00
Old Kashkaval Cheese 1117.0 5.25 59.00
Tulum Cheese 1110.0 5.21 59.00
Fresh Kashkaval Cheese 1181.7 5.16 56.21
Mozzarella Cheese 1062.4 5.33 55.65
Buet Kashkaval Cheese 960.9 5.11 50.16
Fresh Cream Cheese 1014.1 5.38 43.68
Labne 1084.7 4.36 30.87
Low Fat Labne 1085.2 4.41 25.35
Spreadable Cheese 823.8 5.78 39.40
Strained Yogurt 972.1 4.51 25.77
Light Yogurt 1033.1 4.20 18.05
Pasteurized Yogurt 1034.8 4.10 17.52
Extra Light Yogurt 1024.5 4.20 13.19

is measured by a thermocouple and recorded with re- according to the equation given by Carslaw and Jaeger
spect to time during a short heating interval. The ther- (1959):
mal conductivity (k) of the sample is calculated from the
temperaturetime (DTDt) record and power input (Q) Q ln t2 =t1
kF H; 4
T2 T1

where, T1 and T2 are temperatures at times t1 and t2 , Q

Fig. 1. Thermal conductivity measuring probe.
the heat ow per unit time, per unit length of the heating
wire, F and H are specic constants of the probe to be
determined with materials of known thermal conduc-
tivities. By this method, the thermal conductivity is
measured with an accuracy of 5% and reproducibility
of 2%. The time required for each measurement is
about 60 s.
112 I.H. Tavman, S. Tavman / Journal of Food Engineering 41 (1999) 109114

Table 3
Measured and calculated thermal conductivity values of dairy products

Product k (measured) (W/m K) Standard deviation (W/m K) k (calculated by

Eq. (3) at 15C)
15C 30C 15C 30C (W/m K)

Butter 0.227 0.233 0.013 0.009 0.236

Cheddar Cheese 0.345 0.351 0.010 0.001 0.346
Hamburger Cheese 0.381 0.398 0.009 0.005 0.377
Old Kashkaval Cheese 0.368 0.384 0.008 0.007 0.370
Tulum Cheese 0.379 0.377 0.006 0.005 0.368
Fresh Kashkaval Cheese 0.403 0.403 0.009 0.002 0.384
Mozzarella Cheese 0.383 0.380 0.003 0.005 0.384
Buet Kashkaval Cheese 0.406 0.409 0.003 0.001 0.413
Fresh Cream Cheese 0.433 0.434 0.005 0.006 0.432
Labne 0.486 0.463 0.007 0.009 0.473
Low Fat Labne 0.548 0.542 0.025 0.010 0.506
Spreadable Cheese 0.476 0.494 0.003 0.016 0.454
Strained Yogurt 0.540 0.539 0.008 0.012 0.510
Light Yogurt 0.571 0.583 0.005 0.004 0.545
Pasteurized Yogurt 0.571 0.593 0.007 0.022 0.543
Extra Light Yogurt 0.584 0.596 0.002 0.003 0.560

3. Results and discussion
The results of thermal conductivity measurements, in
the solid state, for eleven types of cheese, four types of
yogurt and one butter sample are given in Table 3. For
each sample, the thermal conductivity is measured ve
times at average temperatures of 15C and 30C, the
mean values and the standard deviations are reported.
Fig. 2 illustrates the strong correlation between
thermal conductivity and water content at 15C
(R 0.986). The equations for the linear regression lines
for the measured thermal conductivity versus water
content are as follows:
for 15C : k 0:1696 0:00488Xwater ; R 0:987;
for 30C : k 0:1729 0:00491Xwater ; R 0:969;
where k is the thermal conductivity in W/m K and Xwater
the water content expressed as percent on a wet basis.
The similarity of these equations with Eq. (1) from
Sweat and Parmelee for dairy products and margarines
is remarkable.
Fig. 3 illustrates the correlation between thermal
conductivity and fat content at 15C. The equations for
the linear regression lines for the measured thermal
conductivity versus fat content are as follows:
for 15C : k 0:5422 0:004612Xfat ; R 0:786; 7
for 30C : k 0:5483 0:004674Xfat ; R 0:787; 8
where, Xfat is the fat content expressed as percent on a
wet basis.
There is a general agreement on the qualitative eects
5 of water and protein on the physical properties of cheese
with the casein matrix imparting rigidity and water re-
6
ducing rigidity of cheese (Prentice, Langley & Marshall,
1993). The quantitative contributions of these compo-
nents, in conjunction with fat, on various properties

Fig. 2. Thermal conductivity versus water content for dairy products. Fig. 3. Thermal conductivity versus fat content for dairy products.
 I.H. Tavman, S. Tavman / Journal of Food Engineering 41 (1999) 109114
have not been characterized thoroughly. In a study
conducted by Chen, Larkin, Clark and Irvine (1979) for
a group of diverse varieties of cheese, a linear correlation
was obtained between protein content and hardness,
with a correlation coecient of 0.83. Excluding butter,
there is a linear decrease of thermal conductivity with
protein content as shown in Fig. 4. The equations for the
linear regression lines for the measured thermal con-
ductivity versus protein content are as follows:
for 15C : k 0:5824 0:00752Xprotein ; R 0:730; 9 equations from Choi and Okos (1986). It may be noticed
for 30C : k 0:5861 0:00745Xprotein ; R 0:690; 10
where, Xprotein is the protein content expressed as percent
wet basis.
The eect of temperature was not emphasized in this
study as only two temperature levels were included ex-
cept for four types of cheese studied over a wider range
of temperature, from 4C to 44C (Fig. 5). There is a
slight increase in thermal conductivity with temperature
as shown in Fig. 5. For products with high water content
such as yogurts, an increase in thermal conductivity with
increasing temperature may be expected as the thermal
Fig. 4. Thermal conductivity versus protein content for dairy prod-
ucts.
Fig. 5. Thermal conductivity versus temperature for four types of
cheese.
113
conductivity of water increases with temperature, this
fact is conrmed by literature values from Kent et al.
(1984).
Finally, measured thermal conductivity values at
15C were compared to those calculated from the Choi
and Okos (1986) model, see Table 3. First, the volume
fraction (Xiv ) of pure components for each sample has
been calculated. Then, the thermal conductivity (ki ) of
pure components at 15C has been calculated using
from Table 3, that measured thermal conductivity values
were within 5% to calculated values, which is ap-
proximately the range of experimental error.
4. Conclusions
Thermal conductivity of 16 dierent dairy products
were measured at 15C and 30C. From this study it
may be concluded that thermal conductivity increases
linearly with increase in water content with a very good
correlation coecient, decreases linearly with increase in
fat and protein contents. From the thermal conductivity
measurements for four types of cheese at temperatures
from 4C to 44C, it may be concluded that thermal
conductivity increases slightly with temperature. Fur-
thermore, the measured values were found to be in good
agreement with previous data, especially with data of
similar products from Sweat and Parmelee (1978), and
with the Choi and Okos (1986) model.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge PINAR
Dairy Products Inc. for supplying all the samples for
this work.
References
Artecka, E., Gogol, E., Gogol, W., & Staniszewski, B. (1974). Thermal
conductivity measurements of food products by the heated
thermocouple method. Bulletin of International Institute of
Refrigeration, Commissions B1, C1, C2- Bressanone, pp. 213218.
AOAC (1990). Ocial methods of analysis (15th ed.), Association of
ocial analytical chemists, Food Composition, Washington, DC.
Carslaw, H. S., & Jaeger, J. C. (1959). Conduction of Heat in Solids,
London: Oxford University Press.
Chen, A. H., Larkin, J. W., Clark, C. J., & Irvine, W. E. (1979).
Textural analysis of cheese. Journal of Dairy Science, 62, 901907.
Choi, Y., & Okos, M. R. (1986). Eects of temperature and
composition on the thermal properties of foods. In M. Le Maguer
& P. Jelen, Food Engineering and Process Applications (vol. 1, pp.
93101). London: Elsevier.
Fernandez-Martin, F., & Montes, F. (1972). Inuence of temperature
and composition on some physical properties of milk and milk
concentrations. Part III. Thermal conductivity. Milchwissenschaft,
27(12), 772776.
114 I.H. Tavman, S. Tavman / Journal of Food Engineering 41 (1999) 109114
Kent, M., Cristiansen, K., van Haneghem, I. A., Holtz, E., Morley, M.
G., Nesvadba, P., & Poulsen, K. P. (1984). Cost 90 collaborative
measurements of thermal properties of food. Journal of Food
Engineering, 3, 117150.
Konrad, H., & Rambke, K. (1971). Physikalische eigneschaften
ussiger milchprodukte. 4. Mitt. Warmeleitfahigkeit von Milch,
Rahm und Milchkonzentraten. Die Nahrung, 15(3), 269277.
Leidenfrost, W. (1959). Measurements of the thermal conductivity of
milk. ASME Symposium on Thermal Properties, Purdue Univer-
sity, Lafayette, Ind.
MacCarthy, D. (1984). Engineering and Food (Vol. 1). London:
Applied Science Publishers.
More, G. R., & Prasad, S. (1988). Thermal conductivity of concen-
trated whole milk. Journal of Food Process Engineering, 10, 105
112.
View publication stats
Powell, R. W., Ho, C. Y. & Liley, P. E. (1966). Thermal conductivity
of selected materials. NSRDS-NBS-8 PB 189-698. Natural Techo-
logy Internatinal Service, US Department of Commerce, Spring-
eld, Virginia.
Prentice, J. H., Langley, K. R. & Marshall, R. J. (1993). Cheese
Rheology. In P.F. Fox., Cheese: Chemistry, Physics and Microbi-
ology (Vol. 1, pp. 303340). Elsevier, London.
Reddy, C. S., & Datta, A. K. (1994). Thermophysical properties of
concentrated reconstituted milk during processing. Journal of Food
Engineering, 21, 3140.
Riedel, L. (1949). Warmeleitfahi gkeits messu ngen an Zuckerlosungen,
Fruchtsaften, und Milch. Chemie Ingenieur Technik, 21, 340341.
Sweat, E. V., & Parmelee, C. E. (1978). Measurement of thermal
conductivity of dairy products and margarines. Journal of Food
Process Engineering, 2, 187197.