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Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

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Computers and Electronics in Agriculture


journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compag

The use of articial neural network to predict exergetic performance of spray


drying process: A preliminary study
Mortaza Aghbashlo a,, Hossien Mobli a, Shahin Raee a, Ashkan Madadlou b
a
b

Faculty of Agricultural Engineering and Technology, University of Tehran, Karaj, Iran


Department of Food Technology, Institute of Chemical Technologies, Iranian Research Organization for Science & Technology (IROST), Tehran, Iran

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 19 November 2011
Received in revised form 12 June 2012
Accepted 30 June 2012

Keywords:
Articial neural network (ANN)
Exergetic performance
Spray drying process
Multilayer perceptron (MLP)

a b s t r a c t
A feedforward articial neural network (ANN) was applied to predict the exergetic performance of a
microencapsulation process via spray drying. The exergetic data was obtained from drying experiments
conducted at different inlet drying air temperatures, aspirator rates (drying air ow rates), peristaltic
pump rates (mass ow rates), and spraying air ow rates as inputs for ANN. A multilayer perceptron
(MLP) ANN was utilized to correlate the output parameters (inlet exergy, outlet exergy, lost exergy, destructed exergy, entropy generation, exergy efciency, and improvement potential rate) to the four inputs
parameters. Various error minimization algorithms, transfer functions, number of hidden neurons, and
training epochs were investigated to nd the optimum ANN model. The MLP ANN with Levenberg-Marquardt error minimization algorithm, logarithmic sigmoid transfer function, 20 hidden neurons, and 100
training iterations was selected as the best topology to map the exergetic performance of microencapsulation process according to statistical parameters and model simplicity. The model predicted exergetic
parameters of spray drying process with R2 values greater than 0.98 indicating the delity of the selected
network. Accordingly, the selected ANN model can be applied to determine the exergy efcient drying
conditions to achieve a sustainable spray drying process.
2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Spray drying is an extensively used method for production of
dry powders from pumpable liquids or slurries by atomizing the
liquid into a stream of hot gas and subsequently rapid vaporization of moisture from generated droplets. Spray drying provides
important advantages such as handling the heat sensitive and
heat-resistant uids; production of dry materials with controllable particle size, shape, form, moisture content, and other specic
properties; possibility for a continuous operation adaptable to
both conventional and PLC controls; application of a wide range
of production rates; and extensive exibility in dryer apparatus
design. However, drying is the most energy-intensive unit operation due to the high latent heat of vaporization and the inherent
inefciency of using hot air as the most common drying medium
(Mujumdar, 2006). It also releases signicant amounts of carbon
oxides to the environment. Thus, one of the most important challenges for drying industry is to reduce the energy consumption in
order to reach a cost-efcient, reliable, sustainable, and environmentally friendly drying process.

Corresponding author. Tel.: +98 2612801011; fax: +98 261 2808138.


E-mail address: mortazaaghbashlo@yahoo.com (M. Aghbashlo).
0168-1699/$ - see front matter 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2012.06.007

In recent years, exergy based performance evaluation and subsequent optimization/modeling of drying facilities and processes
has been a growing interest amongst the researchers. Exergy analysis can provide a comprehensive and deeper insight into the process sustainability and new unforeseen ideas for improvements,
and therefore it is applicable for the processes evaluation, optimization, and modeling purposes. Recently, several studies have been
undertaken on exergy analysis of different drying methods (Ozgener and Ozgener, 2006, 2009; Colak and Hepbasli, 2007; Aghbashlo
et al., 2008, 2009; Liapis and Bruttini, 2008; Yongzhong et al.,
2008; Hancioglu et al., 2010; Nazghelichi et al., 2010; Icier et al.,
2010; Hepbasli et al., 2010; Gungor et al., 2011).
Exergetic modeling of a drying operation provides various
advantages in many facets of process such as selection of sustainable operation, designing the exergy efcient equipments, control
of drying process, managing of fuel consumption, recycling of exhaust air, and etc. (Nazghelichi et al., 2011b). Drying is a quite complex and uncertain phenomenon, whose mechanisms are not yet
entirely discovered. In the case of spray drying, the complexity becomes even more pronounced due to a series of transient interconnected stages i.e. liquid atomization, curst formation at droplet
surface, extensive heat and mass transfer, rapid water evaporation,
droplets agglomeration, and wall deposition. Quantication of
relationships between inputs and outputs of an ill-structured process such as spray drying operation using mathematical, statistical

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

33

Nomenclature
A
Cp
e
ex
_
Ex
h
hfg
IP_
_
m
MAE
MSE
P
Q
Q_
R
R2
s
S_
T
v
x
X
Y

y
Z

surface area (m2)


specic heat (kJ/kg K)
specic energy (kJ/kg)
specic exergy (kJ/kg)
rate of exergy (kJ/s)
specic enthalpy (kJ/kg)
latent heat of water (kJ/kg)
improvement potential rate (kJ/s)
mass ow rate (kg/s)
mean absolute error
mean square error
pressure (kPa)
volume ow rate (m3/s)
rate of heat transfer (kJ/s)
specic gas constant (kJ/kg K)
coefcient of determination
specic entropy (kJ/kg K)
rate of entropy (kJ/s K)
temperature (K or C)
velocity (m/s)
mole fraction
fraction of component (%)
value
average value
exponent

Abbreviations
AR
aspirator rate (%)
PPR
peristaltic pump rate (%)
SAFR
spraying air ow rate (l/h)

and analytical methods is much more difcult. Articial neural


networks (ANNs) are nonlinear mapping structures based on the
function of human brain have been extensively used for modeling
and prediction, especially when underlying relationships are unknown. It is worth noting that ANNs provide the potential to identify and classify network activity based on limited, incomplete,
noisy, dynamic and nonlinear data sources.
Several studies have been conducted to identify nonlinear and
complex drying systems and process behaviors using ANNs (Erenturk et al., 2004; Wu and Avramidis, 2006; Erenturk and Erenturk,
2007; Movagharnejad and Nikzad, 2007; Chegini et al., 2008; Tripathy and Kumar, 2009; Omid et al., 2009; Khoshhal et al., 2010;
Balbay et al., 2011; Aghbashlo et al., 2011; Nazghelichi et al.,
2011a,b,c; Gorjian et al., 2011; Cakmak and Yildiz, 2011). Results
of previous studies indicated that ANN models, developed based
on the experiential data, accurately predicted the drying characteristics of different biological and industrial products, and can be applied to other complex and nonlinear processes. A literature survey
showed that there is no information about the exergetic modeling
of spray drying process using ANN. Therefore, the aim of this research is to develop and evaluate the feedforward ANN topology
as an approximating tool for prediction of exergetic performance
of spray drying process.
2. Materials and methods
Selection of the optimal ANN topology involved four steps: (i)
preparation of data required for training, cross-validation and testing, (ii) training of networks by designing the ANN topology using
different learning algorithms, transfer functions, processing

Greek symbols
q
density (kg/m3)
x
humidity ratio of air ()
w
exergy efciency (%)
Subscripts
a
air
at
atmosphere
calc
calculated
d/p
droplet/particle
dc
drying chamber
des
destruction
e
emulsion
exp
experimental
f
saturated liquid state
g
saturated vapor state
gen
generation
i
numerator
in
inlet
l
loss
n
nozzle
out
outlet
p
product
v
water vapor
w
water
0
dead state
1
inlet drying air
10
spraying air
2
inlet wet product
3
outlet moist air
4
dry product

elements (neuron numbers), and training iterations, (iii) testing


the obtained networks with a unseen data set and nally (iv) selection of optimal network according to statistical parameters and
simplicity of ANN topology (Madadlou et al., 2009a).
2.1. Data preparation
Database for development of ANNs were compiled from our
previous report on exergetic performance of spray drying process
(Aghbashlo et al., 2012b). The detailed information on the feed
preparation, spray drying system and exergetic calculation was
also presented in the previous study (Aghbashlo et al., 2012b).
However, a brief explanation of emulsion preparation method,
schematic diagram of the experimental spray dryer system and related theoretical consideration for exergetic calculation is represented in the following subsections. The inlet drying air
temperature, aspirator rate (drying air mass ow rate), peristaltic
pump rate (liquid mass ow rate), and spraying air ow rate were
used as input parameters to ANN model. The total inlet exergy to
drying chamber, total outlet exergy from drying chamber, lost
exergy, destructed exergy, entropy generation, exergy efciency,
and improvement potential rate were used as desired parameters
in ANN model. The total inlet exergy to drying chamber including
the exergy of drying air, exergy of entering water and product, and
exergy of spraying air indicated the maximum useful work possible
during atomization and drying process when the system brought
to the equilibrium state by means reversible processes. The total
outlet exergy from drying chamber including exergy of outlet drying air, exergy of outlet product, and water inside product was a
measure of the potential of outlet streams to cause change, as a

34

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

consequence of not being completely stable relative to the reference environment. The exergy loss from drying chamber to ambient including the exergy losses by means of conductive, convective,
and irradiative heat transfer was the maximum useful work that
could be obtained from lost heat at a kwon state in a given environment. The destructed exergy including destroyed exergy in atomization, heat and mass transfer, moisture evaporation, and etc.
was the possible useful work wasted in process due to irreversibility. The entropy generation could be used to determine the energy
not available for work in atomization and drying process. The exergy efciency could be dened as maximum useful work properly
applied for droplets generation and moisture evaporation to maximum possible useful work supplied to drying chamber by drying
air and spraying air. The improvement potential rate indicated
the potential of effective exergy usage in atomization and drying
process.
The 81 patterns were divided into 49 (60%), 12 (15%), and 20
(25%) data sets for the training, validation, and testing the neural
networks, respectively. Before developing the different ANN topology, some preprocessing operations were carried out: rstly, all
sample data were randomized. Then, data normalization (0.9,
0.9) was achieved through the min-max function. Then, data normalization (0.9, 0.9) was achieved through the min-max function.
The normalized value (Ynormalized) for each raw input/output dataset
(Yi) was calculated as:

Y normalized 0:9 1:8

Y i  Y min
Y max  Y min

2.1.1. Materials and feed preparation


Fish oil and skim milk powder (SMP) were purchased from
Qeshm Fish Oil Co. (QFOC, Qeshm, Iran) and Pegah Dairy Co. (Tehran,

Iran), respectively. Phosphate buffer (pH 7.0) and sodium azide were
purchased from Merck (Darmstadt, Germany).
Twenty gram of skim milk powder was dissolved in seventy
gram of phosphate buffer (5 mM, pH 7.0) and was stirred at
500 rpm for 30 min at room temperature. The wall material solution was stored at 4 C for 10 h to allow complete hydration (Madadlou et al., 2009b) and sodium azide (100 mg/L) was added to
prevent microbial growth. The emulsion was prepared by progressively blending the ten gram sh oil and the wall solution, using a
rotor-stator blender (Ultra-turrax IKA T18Basic, Wilmington, USA),
at 3500 rpm for 2 min. Then, the emulsion was homogenized at
24,000 rpm for 5 min. The prepared emulsion was used as feed to
produce sh oil microcapsule.
2.1.2. Spray drying system and exergetic calculation
The drying of liquid was accomplished using a BCHI Mini
Spray dryer B-191 (Flawil, Switzerland). Fig. 1 shows a schematic
view of used spray dryer at working state with more details.
The compressed air up to 800 l/h was used to disperse the feeding liquid to small droplets through the two-uid internal mixing
nozzle with diameter of 0.7 mm. The dryer was equipped with under pressure creating aspirator motor to provide and regulate the
amount of hot air up to 35 m3/h required for drying of atomized
droplets. The inlet drying air temperature up to 220 C was controlled and monitored on control panel using the PT 100 thermocouple with precision of 1 C. Temperature of outlet air carrying
the particles was measured before entering to the cyclone and
monitored on control panel using PT 100 thermocouple. The peristaltic pump rate was also used to change the liquid feeding rate
into the atomizing nozzle.
During the experiments, the data required for exergetic calculation such as temperature and relative humidity of ambient, inlet

Fig. 1. Schematic view of spray dryer at working condition: (1) Two-uid nozzle, operated by compressed air to disperse the solution into ne droplets. (2) Electric heating of
the drying medium. (3) Spray cylinder for drying the droplets to solid particles. (4) Separation of the particles in the cyclone. (5) Outlet lter to remove ne particles. (6)
Aspirator for generating the ow.

35

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

Fig. 2. Schematic illustration of drying process with input and output terms.

and outlet air, temperature of dryer chamber, initial and nal


weight of liquid container, and weight of generated particles were
recorded. Also, 2 g of nished particles was dried in an oven
(Memmert, Germany) at 70 C for 24 h to determine the moisture
content. Weight measurement were performed using AAA 250L
balance (Adam Co., UK) with precision of 0.0001 g. Drying experiments were carried out at inlet drying air temperatures of 140,
160 and 180 C, nominal aspirator rates of 55%, 65%, and 75%, nominal peristaltic pump rates of 5%, 10%, and 15% and spraying air
ow rate of 600, 700, and 800 l/h.
Fig. 2 indicates the spray drying system with input and output
terms, schematically (Dincer and Sahin, 2004).
The mass balance equation for product, air and water were as
follows:
_ p 2 m
_ p 4 m
_ p 40 m
_p
Product m
_ a 1 m
_ a 10 m
_ a 3
Air
m
Water

2
3

x1 m_ a 1 x10 m_ a 10 m_ w 2 x3 m_ a 3 m_ w 4 m_ w 40

The energy balance equation for drying system was written as


follows:

_ a 1 ea 1 m
_ a 10 ea 10 m
_ p 2 ep 2 m
_ w 2 ew 2
m

hfg 2:503  106  2:386  103 T  273:16


hfg 7:33  1012  1:60  107 T 2 0:5

10

The specic energy of the spraying air at the given temperatures


was obtained as follows:

ea 10 C p a 10 T 10  T 0 x10 hfg 10

where

_ a 1 qa 1 Q a 1
m

v a 21
ea 1 C p a 1 T 1  T 0 x1 hfg 1
2  1000
Q a 1
v a 1
Aa 1

7
8

Qa is the volume ow rate of drying air (m3/s) and was determined


from dryer operation manual.
The specic heat capacity of air was determined as follows
(Moran and Shapiro, 1995).

C p a 1:04841  0:000383719T

7:92981T
1014

9:45378T 2
7

10

5:49031T 3
1010

v a 210
2  1000

11

The spraying air velocity was approximately equal to the velocity of


sprayed droplets and was approximated as follows:

Q a 10 Q e 2
An
_ a 10 qa 10 Q a 10
m
P 0
qa 10 1
Ra T 10
_ e 2
m
Q e 2
qe 2

v a 10 v d=p

12
13
14
15

Q a 10 is the volume ow rate of spraying (l/h).


The specic energy of sprayed wet product was calculated using
Eq. (16).

_ a 3 ea 3 m
_ p 4 ep 4 m
_ p 40 ep 40 m
_ w 4 ew 4
m
_ w 40 ew 40 Q_ l
m

273:16 6 TK 6 338:72

338:72 6 TK 6 533:16

ep 2 C p p 2 T 2  T 0

v a 2d=p

2  1000
v a 210
C p p 2 T 10  T 0
2  1000

16

The specic heat of the fresh and dried products was determined as
follows (Choi and Okos, 1986):

C p p

X
X i C p i

17

Equations used in calculation of specic heat of product are presented in Appendix (Table A1). The chemical composition of product used in specic heat calculation was 23.33% protein, 34.66%
fat, 34.66% carbohydrate, 5% ber, and 6% ash, according to skim
milk powder and sh oil manufacturers reports.
The specic energy of sprayed water inside the droplets was
calculated as follows:

where the unit of temperature is Kelvin (K).


The latent heat of vaporization was computed at the saturation
condition by Brooker (1967) equation:

ew 2 C p w 2 T 10  T 0

v a 2d=p

2  1000
v a 210
C p w 2 T 10  T 0
2  1000

18

36

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

The specic energy of outlet air was identied as follows:

ea 3 C p a 3 T 3  T 0 x3 hfg 3

2
a 3

v
2  1000

_ a 3
m
v a 3
qa 3 Aa 3

The specic exergy of sprayed wet product was determined using


Eq. (31).

19
20

The specic energy of outlet dried product and water was calculated using Eqs. (21) and (22).
v a 24
v a 23
C p p 4 T 3  T 0
2  1000
2  1000
2
2
v a 4
v a 3
C p w 4 T 3  T 0
ew 4 C p w 4 T 4  T 0
2  1000
2  1000
ep 4 C p p 4 T 4  T 0

21
22

The specic energy of stuck products (wall deposited product) was


calculated using following equation. It was assumed that product
heated up to the temperature of inlet drying air and capsules lost
their moisture completely.

ep 40 C p p 40 T 40  T 0 C p p 40 T 1  T 0

23

_ w 40 0
m
_ w 40 ew 40 0
m

24

v 2d=p

exp 2 hp T 2 ;P 10  hp T 0 ;P 0   T 0 sp T 2 ;P 10  sp T 0 ;P 0 
2  1000

 
T2
v a 210
C p p 2 T 2  T 0  T 0 ln

31
T0
2  1000

The specic exergy of water inside the sprayed droplets was determined as follows:

exw 2 hf T 2  hg T 0  v f P10  Pg T 2   T 0 sf T 2


Pg T 0
v a 210
 sg T 0  T 0 Rv ln

0
xv P 0
2  1000

32

The specic exergy of outlet air was obtained as


exa 3 C p a 3 x3 C p v 3 T 3  T 0

 
 
T3
P3
 T 0 C p a 3 x3 C p v 3  ln
 Ra x3 Rv ln
T0
P0



 
1 1:6078x0
x3
T 0 Ra x3 Rv ln
1:6078x3 Ra ln
1 1:6078x3
x0
2

25

v a 3
2  1000

33

The exergy balance equation was written for the dryer systems as
follows:

P3
P at
v a 23


qa 3 qa at
2

_ a 1 exa 1 m
_ a 10 exa 10 m
_ p 2 exp 2 m
_ w 2 exw 2
m

Specic exergy of nished particle and water inside the capsules


were obtained as follows:

_ a 3 exa 3 m
_ p 4 exp 4 m
_ p 40 exp 40 m
_ w 4 exw 4
m
_ l Ex
_ des
_ w 40 exw 40 Ex
m

26

Specic exergy of inlet drying air was obtained as follows:


exa 1 C p a 1 x1 C p v 1 T 1  T 0

 
 
T1
P1
 T 0 C p a 1 x1 C p v 1 ln
 Ra x1 Rv ln
T0
P0



 
1 1:6078x0
x1
T 0 Ra x1 Rv ln
1:6078x1 Ra ln
1 1:6078x1
x0

2
a 1

v
2  1000

The pressure of inlet drying air was determined using Bernoulli law.

28

The specic heat of water vapor was obtained using following equation with a correlation coefcient of 0.9949 (R2 = 0.9949).

C p v 1:6083 8  104 T  1  107 T 2 7  1012 T 3


175 6 TK 6 6000


 
T4
v a 24

exp 4 C p p 4 T 4  T 0  T 0 ln
T0
2  1000

 
T3
v a 23

C p p 4 T 3  T 0  T 0 ln
T0
2  1000

35

and,

exw 4 hf T 3  hg T 0  v f P3  Pg T 3   T 0 sf T 3


Pg T 0
v a 23

 sg T 0  T 0 Rv ln
x0v P0
2  1000

36

The specic exergy of stuck products was computed as follows:


27

P1
Pat
v a 21


qa 1 qa at
2

34


 

 
T 0
T1
C p p 40 T 1  T 0  T 0 ln
exp 40 C p p 40 T 40  T 0  T 0 ln 4
T0
T0
_ w 40 exw 40 0
m

37
38

Moreover, the exergy associated with heat loss to ambient was


identied as follows:



_ l 1  T 0 Q_ l
Ex
T dc

39

Exergy efciency of the spray drying process is the ratio of exergy


use (investment) in the drying of the product to exergy of the drying
air supplied (including the exergy of spraying air) to the system:

29
Exergy investment in the evaporation of moisture in the product
 100 40
Exergy of drying air supplied Exergy of spraying air
_ w ev exw 3  exw 2 
m
w
 100
41
_ a 10 exa 10
_ a 1 exa 1 m
m
w

The specic ow exergy of spraying air was determined from the


following equation:


exa 10 C p a 10 x10 C p v 10 T 10  T 0

 
 
T 0
P 0
 T 0 C p a 10 x10 C p v 10 ln 1  Ra x10 Rv ln 1
T0
P0



 
1 1:6078x0
x10
T 0 Ra x10 Rv ln
1:6078x10 Ra ln
1 1:6078x10
x0
2

v a 10

2  1000

30

where
_ w ev m
_ w 2  m
_ w 4
m

42

P g T 0
43
exw 3 hf T 3 ;P v 3  hg T 0   T 0 sT 3 ;P v 3  sg T 0  T 0 Rv ln
x0v P 0


and

Pv 3 xv 3 P3

44

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

37

Fig. 3. Schematic structure of the MLP ANN.

The mole fraction of vapor was approximated as follows:

xv

x1  0:622x
0:622

45

The exergy destroyed or the irreversibility may be expressed as


follows:

_ des T 0 S_ gen
Ex

46

Van Gool (1997) has proposed that maximum improvement in the


exergy efciency for a process or system was obviously achieved
when the exergy loss or irreversibility was minimized. Consequently, he suggested that it was useful to use the concept of an
exergetic improvement potential when analyzing different processes or sectors of the economy and this improvement potential
in the rate form given by Hammond and Stapleton (2001):

_
IP



w
_ out
_ in  Ex
1
Ex
100

47

The experiments were performed in a room with T 0 25  C; P0


101:325 kPa; x0v 0:003211, and x0 = 0.002 kg water/kg dry air.
The total inlet and outlet exergy was computed as follows:

_ in m
_ a 1 exa 1 m
_ a 10 exa 10 m
_ p 2 exp 2 m
_ w 2 exw 2 48
Ex
_Exout m
_ a 3 exa 3 m
_ p 4 exp 4 m
_ w 4 exw 4
49
2.2. Development of ANN
A multilayer perceptron (MLP) neural network with various
numbers of hidden layers (one, two, and three) was trained and
tested. MLP is a layered feedforward network typically trained with
static backpropagation. Its main advantage is that it is easy to use,
and that it can approximate any input/output map. Amongst the
developed networks with different hidden layers, one hidden layer
MLP neural network has presented the best results. Therefore, it

was determined that an one hidden layer ANN with appropriate error minimization algorithms and transfer function and with a sufcient number of hidden neurons and training epochs was capable
of approximating exegetic parameters of spray drying process.
Structure of the MLP ANN used in this study for predicting the inlet
exergy, outlet exergy, lost exergy, destructed exergy, entropy generation, exergy efciency, and improvement potential is shown in
Fig. 3.
As shown in Fig. 3, this type of neural network is a supervised network because it requires a desired output in order to
learn. The goal of MLP ANN is to establish a model that accurately maps the input/output relationships using experimental
data so that the model can then be used to produce the output when the desired output is unseen. The MLP ANN learns
using a backpropagation algorithm i.e., the input data is
repeatedly presented to the ANN and the error is calculated
for each presentation by comparing the output of the neural
network with the desired output. Then, the computed error
is fed back or backpropagated to the ANN to adjust the
weights (Jha, 2007).
The effect of various error minimization algorithms including
gradient descent momentum (GDM), Levenberg-Marquardt (LM),
conjugate gradient (CG), and quick propagation (QP) on ANN performance were investigated. Different transfer functions including
hyperbolic tangent sigmoid (tansig), logarithmic sigmoid (logsig),
linear hyperbolic tangent sigmoid, and linear logarithmic sigmoid
transfer functions were utilized for determination of neuron output. After using appropriate learning algorithm and transfer function, the effect of neurons number and training epochs were
investigated on ANN performance. To develop a statistically
sound model, networks were trained three times and the best
values were recorded for each parameter (Omid et al., 2009).
NeuroSolutions software version 6.0 (NeuroDimension Inc.,
Gainesville, FL) was used for the design and testing of ANN
models.

38

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

2.3. Selection of optimal ANN


The nal MLP ANN was selected on the basis of the lowest error
on cross-validation data set. Goodness of t of the selected ANN to
the experimental data was based on the coefcient of determination (R2), mean square error (MSE), and mean absolute error
(MAE) for tested models (Madadlou et al., 2009a). These statistical
parameters are as follows (Aghbashlo et al., 2011):

2
PN
i
ycalc  yiexp
i1
R2 1  PN

i
 2
i1 ycalc  y
N

2
1X
MSE
yicalc  yiexp
N i1
MAE

47
48

N 

1X
 i

ycalc  yiexp 
N i1

49

3. Results and discussion


The exergetic performance of spray drying process of sh oil
microencapsulation has been extensively discussed in our previously published works (Aghbashlo et al., 2012a; Aghbashlo et al.,
2012b). The amount of total inlet exergy entering to drying chamber increased by increasing drying air temperature and aspirator
rate due to higher amount of energy and mass ow rate supplied
to drying chamber. Higher amount of kinetics exergy of spraying
air was responsible for higher inlet exergy as spraying air ow rate
increased. However, the changing mass ow rate of feed did not
lead to signicant difference in total inlet exergy due to smaller
amount of feeding volume and lower specic heat of feed. Increasing drying air temperature and aspirator rate was associated with
the higher outlet exergy due to higher amount of inlet exergy, as
previously explained. Destructing of exergy in atomization process,
heating up of cold spraying air, and ne sprayed droplets were the
main reasons for lower outlet exergy as spraying air ow rate increased. The lower outlet exergy obtained for lower feed rate due
to higher exergy loss from drying chamber to ambient and higher
exergy destruction for drying of ne droplets. Increasing drying air
temperature, aspirator rate, and spraying air ow rate heightened
the exergy loss to ambient possibly due to an increase in side heat
loss coefcient. Increasing feed mass ow rate reduced the exergy

loss because of utilizing more exergy for drying process. The exergy
destruction increased by increasing drying air temperature due to
intensive heat and mass transfer. The effect of feed mass ow rate
and spraying air ow rate on exergy destruction previously claried. The increasing aspirator rate did not lead to a known relation
with exergy destruction. The inuence of dryer operational parameters on entropy generation was similar to the exergy destruction
due to linear relation between exergy destruction and entropy generation (Eq. (46)). The exergy efciency decreased with increasing
drying air temperature, aspirator rate, and spraying air ow rate
because of reverse correlation between these parameters and exergetic efciency (Eq. (41)). However, increasing feed mass ow rate
enhanced exergy efciency since major part of supplied exergy to
drying chamber utilized for evaporation of moisture from sprayed
droplets. The improvement potential increased with increasing
drying air temperature, aspirator rate, and spraying air ow rate
due to an increase in total inlet exergy and a decrease in exergy
efciency. Whereas, the feed mass ow rate had inverse inuence
on improvement potential due to an increase in exergy efciency,
as previously elucidated.
The variation of training and cross-validation MSE for different
conguration of the error minimization algorithms and transfer
functions is shown in Table 1. It is interesting to note that the
transfer functions are mathematical equations that specify the output of a neuron. The transfer functions of articial neurons hinder
outputs from reaching very large magnitude which can disable
ANN and thus inhibit the training (Jha, 2007). Activation function
exhibits great variety, and has the meaningful inuence on learning and performance of ANNs. Also, a function optimization problem or error minimization algorithm is dened as a procedure to
determine the best network parameters (weights and biases) in order to minimize the network error.
In ANN designing procedure, the linear transfer function was
used in the output layer due to regression nature of this work. Also,
in the GDM and QP error minimization algorithms, the step size
was set to 0.1 and the momentum term to 0.7 (Omid et al.,
2009). The step size is a measure of steps taken in the weight space
to escape from local minima in the error surface. This means that if
the step size to be too small, the learning is slow and the network is
less capable. If the step size to be too high, the learning is fast and
rapid uctuations for the mean squared error and resulting slow
convergence to the lower error state (Abraham and Nath, 1999;
Abraham, 2004). Too small momentum term leads to an extremely

Table 1
Variation of training and cross-validation MSE for different congurations of the error minimization algorithms and transfer functions using MLP ANN.
Transfer
function

Learning
algorithm

5 Neurons/500 epochs

10 Neurons/1000 epochs

15 Neurons/1500 epochs

20 Neurons/2000 epochs

Training

Crossvalidation

Training

Crossvalidation

Training

Crossvalidation

Training

Crossvalidation

tan sigm

GD
LM
CG
QP

1.237E03
6.313E04
8.410E04
2.289E03

1.314E03
7.189E04
8.191E04
1.815E03

7.402E04
1.037E04
3.954E04
1.512E03

8.660E04
3.709E04
5.612E04
1.305E03

4.946E04
6.961E06
3.137E04
8.792E04

5.457E04
2.718E04
3.985E04
1.112E03

3.731E04
9.745E08
2.353E04
7.146E04

5.604E04
4.517E04
3.644E04
9.858E04

log sigm

GD
LM
CG
QP

2.669E03
6.270E04
1.250E03
1.456E02

2.114E03
7.036E04
1.091E03
9.859E03

2.209E03
9.621E05
8.769E04
2.653E03

1.756E03
2.862E04
1.018E03
2.131E03

2.247E03
4.326E06
6.543E04
2.437E03

1.840E03
3.088E04
7.816E04
1.979E03

2.118E03
8.092E08
5.914E04
2.417E03

1.882E03
3.993E04
7.400E04
1.921E03

Linear tan sigm

GD
LM
CG
QP

1.811E03
1.223E03
1.096E03
1.973E03

1.446E03
1.111E03
1.237E03
1.657E03

7.746E04
3.356E04
5.180E04
1.495E03

1.092E03
8.269E04
6.363E04
1.432E03

6.551E04
2.074E04
3.331E04
1.212E03

8.162E04
7.432E04
5.474E04
1.206E03

4.350E04
1.481E04
4.058E04
8.650E04

7.191E04
7.294E04
8.519E04
1.290E03

Linear log sigm

GD
LM
CG
QP

2.010E03
2.532E03
2.160E03
1.239E02

1.943E03
1.803E03
1.725E03
6.622E03

1.800E03
1.776E03
1.487E03
2.288E03

1.479E03
1.803E03
1.709E03
1.835E03

1.007E03
7.370E04
1.350E03
1.987E03

1.505E03
1.185E03
1.434E03
1.901E03

7.663E04
9.262E04
7.870E04
1.535E03

1.019E03
1.358E03
1.157E03
1.209E03

39

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243


Table 2
Performance of the selected MLP ANN for exergetic prediction of spray drying process.
Parameter

Inlet exergy

Outlet exergy

Lost exergy

Destructed exergy

Entropy generation

Exergy efciency

Improvement potential rate

MSE
MAE
R2

0.7052
0.68528
0.9984

2.4379
1.1829
0.9958

2.6189
1.3159
0.9841

7.2712
2.2341
0.9842

0.0092
0.0759
0.9859

7.7968E05
0.0073
0.9994

2.4693
1.3369
0.9983

Fig. 5. The average values of training and validating errors vs. the number of
training epochs for the selected network.

Fig. 4. MSE of various MLP ANN vs. the number of hidden layers for different
number of neurons and training epochs.

slow convergence of algorithm in error minimization procedure,


and too high momentum term may probably lead to the divergence
of algorithm (Aghbashlo et al., 2011, Abraham and Nath, 1999). It is
clear from Table 1 (bolded line) that LM algorithm with logarithmic sigmoid transfer function was the best selection based on
the results of training and cross-validation errors for the seven outputs. This algorithm provides a numerical solution to the problem
of minimizing a (generally nonlinear) function, over a space of
parameters for the function. The sigmoidal functions such as logarithmic sigmoid function are prevalent in approximating ANN due
to nonlinear and continuously differentiable nature of them which
are favorable for network learning (Jha, 2007). The mathematical
denition of logarithmic sigmoid transfer function is (Erenturk
and Erenturk, 2007)

log sigm

1
1 expZ

50

Therefore, this study was continued by changing the number of


hidden neurons and training epochs from 230 and 1002000,
respectively, using selected transfer function and error minimization algorithms to create nonlinear mapping between inputs and
outputs. It is mentioned that number of input and output neurons

are determined by dimensions of input and output data, so that


only the number of hidden neurons is to be decided by users (Omid
et al., 2009). To select the number of neurons and training epochs,
45 trial congurations of MLP ANN with LM error minimization
algorithm and logarithmic sigmoid transfer function were designed
and tested.
The optimal network was selected to give the minimum MSE on
training and cross-validation set during the training process. The
variation of training MSE for different congurations of developed
ANNs is shown in Fig. 4. It is obvious from this gure that number
of neurons had a signicant effect on ANNs performance, while the
training epoch showed a negligible effect on training and cross-validation MSE. Also, it is clear that the increasing neurons number
from 10 to 30 did not lead to a large reduction in MSE. Therefore,
the ANN with 10 neurons, 100 training epochs, LM error minimization algorithm and logarithmic sigmoid transfer function was selected according to simplicity of ANN topology and little time
required for training process.
Too few hidden neurons reduce the capability of ANN to map
the input/output relation. As well, in ANNs with too many hidden
neurons, networks learn insignicant details and therefore overtting occurs (Ebrahimpour et al., 2008). It is worth noting that the
increase in number of neurons enhance the training time and complicate the ANN topology, considerably. Too few epochs diminish
the capability of the ANN to model the process i.e., ANN cannot
learn the details and therefore undertrain occurs. On the other
hand, too many epochs lead to an overtraining in ANN training
and its failure to learn the input/output data relationship resulting
in an increased mean square error values (Nazghelichi et al.,
2011a). Also, it is mentioned that the increase in the number of
neurons decrease the number of epochs required and seems to
aid in convergence (reduced uctuations).
Fig. 5 shows the average values of training and validating errors
vs. the number of training epochs for the selected network. It is
clear from this gure, that the error for training and cross-validation had a falling form since by increasing the learning iteration,
the errors were fed back to the neurons and used to adjust the
weights such that the error reduces by iteration and the neural

40

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

Fig. 6. Comparison of predicted and desired output values for the inlet exergy, outlet exergy, lost exergy, destructed exergy, entropy generation, exergy efciency, and
improvement potential rate using selected MLP ANN.

41

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243


Table 3
Seven regression models to predict 7 exergetic parameters of spray drying process.
The empirical models

R2

Inlet exergy (J/s) = 296.749 + 1.515  Tin + 2.204  AR + 2.065  PPR + 0.125  SAFR
Outlet exergy (J/s) = 83.967 + 0.459  Tin + 1.283  AR + 3.92  PPR0.043  SAFR
Lost exergy (J/s) = 85.704 + 0.506  Tin + 0.73  AR0.964  PPR0.007  SAFR
Destructed exergy (J/s) = 127.07 + 0.548  Tin + 0.19  AR0.891  PPR + 0.16  SAFR
Entropy generation (J/s K) = 0.426 + 0.0018  Tin + 0.00063  AR0.0029  PPR + 0.00053  SAFR
Exergy efciency (%) = 14.570.052  Tin0.076  AR + 0.778  PPR0.0039  SAFR
Improvement potential (J/s) = 207.92 + 1.047  Tin + 0.9466  AR  2.607  PPR + 0.162  SAFR

0.9906
0.9906
0.9697
0.9665
0.9665
0.9681
0.9879

Table A1
Specic heat of different product components and water as the function of temperature (C) (Singh and Heldman, 2001).
Component

Equation, T (C)

Protein
Fat
Carbohydrate
Fiber
Ash
Water

(Cp)Protein = 2.0082 + 1.2089  103T  1.3129  106T2


(Cp)Fat = 1.9842 + 1.4733  103T  4.8008  106T2
(Cp)Carbohydrate = 1.5488 + 1.9625  103T  5.9399  106T2
(Cp)Fiber = 1.8459 + 1.8306  103T  4.6509  106T2
(Cp)Ash = 1.0926 + 1.8896  103T  3.6817  106T2
(Cp)Water = 4.0817  5.3062  103T + 9.9516  104T2 0 6 T (C) 6 150

Table A2
Weights and biases of the MLP ANN model for exergetic prediction of sh oil microencapsulation process by spray drying.
Weights connecting input layer and hidden layer (W104)
1.838
1.112
0.089
1.010
0.551
2.233
0.208
0.370
0.768
0.568
2.030
2.102
0.204
0.064
0.916
3.038
1.206
0.680
1.118
1.024
1.139
1.165
0.588
0.004
0.128
0.519
1.179
0.463
2.166
0.666
1.612
0.990
0.808
0.356
0.725
0.113
0.815
1.075
1.379
0.565
Biases in hidden layer (B101)
0.472
0.214

2.160

0.830

2.844

1.178

1.400

1.775

0.326

Weights connecting hidden layer and output layer (W710)


0.486
0.789
0.546
0.591
0.189
0.728
0.250
0.849
0.772
1.405
0.178
0.696
0.345
0.308
1.653
2.800
0.270
0.903
0.316
0.008
0.313
0.297
1.631
2.785
0.512
0.493
0.826
1.413

0.034
0.047
1.314
0.673
0.378
0.704
0.006

2.082
2.477
1.073
0.524
0.435
0.522
0.655

0.360
1.010
0.162
0.664
0.725
0.578
0.571

0.095
0.246
0.664
0.864
1.606
0.889
0.235

1.170
0.990
2.162
1.669
2.256
1.837
2.585

0.156
1.127
0.945
0.385
2.846
0.407
0.859

1.115

0.492

0.132

Bias in output layer (B71)


0.661
1.063

0.911

0.411

0.580

model gets closer and closer to produce the desired output. As well,
it is clear from this gure that ANN model successfully trained,
indicating that the selected ANN topology was able to properly
establish the relationship between the input and output parameters. It has been mentioned that a well-trained ANN model is vital
to map and create input/output relations (Chegini et al., 2008).
Performance of the selected ANN with a LM error minimization
algorithm, logarithmic sigmoid transfer function, 20 neurons, and
100 training epochs for exergetic predation of spray drying process
is shown in Table 2. Values of R2, MSE, and MAE obtained using the
selected ANN model in testing step was within the acceptable level.
According to Table 2, the best approximation belonged to exergy
efciency, with respective MSE, MAE, R2 values of 7.7968  105,
0.0073, and 0.9994, and the least acceptable approximation belonged to lost exergy, with respective MSE, MAE, R2 values of
2.6189, 1.3159, and 0.9841.
In selected MLP ANN, the network returned 10  5 weights and
10 bias values connecting input layer and hidden layer, and 5  10

weights and 5 bias value connecting hidden layer and output layer
(Tables A2).
The exact and predicted values for each unseen data by the selected ANN are shown in Fig. 6. It is observed that the predicted
values are in good agreement with exact values and prediction error is negligible. Therefore, the selected MLP ANN model with the
developed structure for exergetic performance of spray drying process is capable to predict the responses with the lowest error and
has the potential to be generalized to a new input which has never
been used during its training.
In this research the multiple linear regression models were
developed for seven output parameters as the function of four input parameter and are reported in Table. 3. A comparison between
correlation coefcients, R2, of the ANN model (Table 2) with those
of 7 regression models (Table 3) indicates that ANN model is superior to regression models in predicting the exergetic performance
of spray drying process for all parameters. This is an additional evidence of the applicability of MLP ANN for simulating the complex

42

M. Aghbashlo et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 88 (2012) 3243

and nonlinear dynamic systems such as drying process. This indicates that the developed ANN model can accurately track the
experimental data and can certainly replace the mathematically
constitutive models for exergetic prediction of spray drying process, since it takes better into account experimental data and automatically improves itself through learning. Moreover, ANN models
have the capability to improve their performance by re-learning
new data with or without new processing conditions (Chegini
et al., 2008). If the spray dryer system is utilized at specied operational condition of inlet drying air temperature, aspirator rate,
peristaltic pump rate, and spraying air ow rate, the exergetic performance of drying process can be predicted, controlled, and optimized in real-time by one set of MLP ANN weights.
It is worthy to note that in mathematical approaches, an empirical model is required for each output, whereas a properly trained
MLP ANN use only one set of weights for all drying conditions and
is able to produce simultaneously all outputs together. Unlike the
empirical models that are applicable for data prediction in the simulated range, a trained ANN can estimate process behavior for both
in and out of simulated range. Of course, the empirical models are
physically explainable, whereas it is difcult to interpret the MLP
ANN structure. It is related to the black box nature of ANNs which
does not give real information on weighting factors of individual
components to the user, although various sensitivity tests and model
comparisons may provide information into their physical meanings
(Omid et al., 2009). As well, the mathematically constitutive models
require less computational efforts when compared to ANN.
4. Conclusion
In this study, supervised ANN and mathematical models were
developed for determining the exergetic performance of spray drying process. For this purpose, experimental results of spray drying
process at different inlet drying air temperature, aspirator rate,
peristaltic pump rate, and spraying air ow rate were used. It
was concluded that the MLP ANN approach for exergetic prediction
of spray drying process is capable of yielding good results and can
be considered as an attractive alternative to traditional regression
models and other related statistical approaches. This approach was
able to determine the nonlinear relationship between input and
output data supplied to the system during the training phase and
on that basis, makes a prediction of what the exergetic performance would be in any dryer operational condition. The developed
models could be utilized to determine the appropriate drying conditions of spray drying process to reach the sustainable and exergy
efcient process in industrial drying.
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to extend their appreciation for nancial
support provided by University of Tehran.
Appendix A
See Tables A1 and A2.
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