Abstract
Studies on the use of edible insects as an alternative protein source have been increasing and are of great interest. The present study focused on differences in the structure of industrially used edible insects dried by different methods: hot air-drying (HAD) and freeze-drying (FD), which are commonly used in the food industry, and the effects on the physical properties of powders after grinding. The two species of crickets used in this study, two-spotted cricket and house cricket, showed a fibrous interior structure after FD, while multiple large cavities were formed after HAD due to significant shrinkage during drying. Although the silkworm larvae were less fibrous than the crickets after FD, they contained finely crushed mulberry leaves inside the gastrointestinal tract that had been ingested as their food source. Powders produced from the HAD samples showed significantly low lightness values due to browning during drying in all insect species, and this trend was more pronounced in the silkworm larva powder. The cricket samples after HAD generated coarser particles after grinding, while the FD crickets produced finer fibrous particles. Microscopic observation of the FD cricket powders revealed that the fine particles adhered to the surface of the coarse particles. Overall, the finer particles tended to have lower flowability. However, the significantly lower flowability of the FD powder compared to the HAD powder was more pronounced than the influence of particle size, and this difference was attributed to the presence of fine fibrous particles in the FD powders. The results suggest that some remedial treatment for flowability will be required for the industrial application of FD-derived insect powders. The fundamental knowledge obtained in this study will assist in designing efficient processing systems for the industrial use of edible insect powders.
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Data Availability
The datasets generated or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 22H02471.
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Yasumasa Ando: conceptualization, methodology, investigation, formal analysis, writing–original draft. Takashi Watanabe: methodology, investigation, formal analysis, writing–review & editing. Takahiro Orikasa: methodology, data curation, writing–review & editing. Satoru Tomita: conceptualization, funding acquisition, project administration, writing–review & editing.
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Ando, Y., Watanabe, T., Orikasa, T. et al. Structural Differences Between Hot Air-Dried and Freeze-Dried Two-Spotted Cricket (Gryllus bimaculatus), House Cricket (Acheta domesticus), and Silkworm (Bombyx mori) Larvae and Their Effect on Powder Properties After Grinding. Food Bioprocess Technol (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11947-023-03243-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11947-023-03243-6