Degradation kinetics of anthocyanins in sour cherry depending on the drying temperature

Abstract

Among the domestic fruit species, sour cherries belong to the most popular fruits. In the fruit processing industry, they are canned in their own juice or syrups, processed to concentrates, juices, preserved by drying, etc. Republic of Moldova currently exports more than 500 tons of dried cherries with a perspective to increase this amount.However, no detailed information is available about the effect of drying on the degradation of anthocyanins, which are an important component of cherries and cherry products and plays a critical role in color quality of them. Cyanidin–3–glucoside is the major anthocyanin present in sour cherry, which is not stable similar to all anthocyanins and could be decolorized or degraded by many factors, for example, temperature, oxygen, enzyme, light and time, during processing and storage. Our objectives were to determine the impact of drying temperatures on the anthocyanin stability and evaluate the kinetics of anthocyanin degradation in the sour cherries drying process.