Journal of Food Engineering 74 (2006) 376–382

www.elsevier.com/locate/jfoodeng

Viscoelastic properties of sweet potato puree infant food

Jasim Ahmed *, Hosahalli S. Ramaswamy
Department of Food Science and Agricultural Chemistry, Macdonald Campus of McGill University, Ste. Anne de Bellevue, PQ, Canada H9X 3V9

Received 11 December 2004; accepted 7 March 2005

Available online 19 April 2005

Abstract

Dynamic mechanical spectroscopy and steady-shear rheological tests were carried out to evaluate viscoelastic properties of com-
mercial sweet potato puree infant food using a controlled stress rheometer. The puree behaved like an elastic solid with G 0 predom-
inating over G00 (G 0 > G00 ). Both elastic and viscous moduli decreased with an increase in temperature while an abnormal increase in
G 0 was noticed at 65 °C. Steady shear viscometry, covering the shear rate range 0.1 to 100 s
1, generally indicated the presence of
yield stress and good fit of data by the Herschel–Bulkley model. The complex shear viscosity (g ) and apparent viscosity (g)
decreased with temperature between 5 and 50 °C. A modified Cox–Merz rule with a shift factor resulted in superimposition of steady
and dynamic shear viscosity data. A deviation in rheological behavior at and above 65 °C was likely caused by gelatinization and
possible amylase–lipid complex formation of sweet potato starch as confirmed by two distinct DSC thermal transitions peaks (57
and 94.5 °C).
Ó 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Sweet potato puree; Elastic modulus; Viscous modulus; Complex viscosity; Cox–Merz rule

1. Introduction be breast-fed or when breast-feeding alone becomes

A growing concern for safer foods has led research
into increased infant food formulation and process
monitoring procedures. The nutrient composition of in-
fant formulations is often very different from the com-
position of breast milk. Important nutrients found in
breast milk may be missing in infant formulas. However,
with an increase in numbers of working mothers and
need for preparatory convenience, the demand of infant
foods has been increased significantly. The World
Health Organization (WHO) recognizes that there is a
legitimate market for infant formula, when a mother
cannot or chooses not to breast feed her child. There
is obviously a need for nutritionally balanced, energy
dense, easily digestible weaning foods, especially for
the first six months in the case of infants who cannot
*
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: jahmed2k@yahoo.com (J. Ahmed), hosahalli.
ramaswamy@mcgill.ca (H.S. Ramaswamy).
insufficient (Hansen, Hosek, Callan, & Jones, 1981).
Presently, various preparations of weaning foods are
available in the market with age group and nutritional
needs. These foods are semi-solid in nature that makes
easy to handle and feed the infants.
In many developing countries, infant foods are pre-
pared from locally available sources mainly cereals,
roots and tubers, which served as a thick porridge form
(Sanni, Onilude, & Ibidapo, 1999). Sweet potatoes (Ipo-
moea batatas L. Lam) are an economical and healthy
food crop containing high b-carotene, substantial
amounts of ascorbic acid and minerals (Woolfe, 1992).
Globally, the sweet potato is an important staple food
or base material for variety of food and industrial appli-
cations (Ravi, Aked, & Balagopalan, 1996; Tian, Ric-
kard, & Blanshard, 1991). Pureeing of sweet potato is
carried out on a large scale in the United States with
most of it utilized to manufacture baby foods (Woolfe,
1992). The product has advantages as infant food over
other cereal based baby foods, especially wheat and

0260-8774/$ - see front matter Ó 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jfoodeng.2005.03.010
 J. Ahmed, H.S. Ramaswamy / Journal of Food Engineering 74 (2006) 376–382
wheat related cereals, due to its hypoallergenic effect
(Maleki, 2001). Baby food manufacturers recommended
that the product should be served warm before feeding
and consumed quickly. Any left over feed should be
properly refrigerated if intended to be consumed within
72 h. Since the feed is semi-solid, the textural properties
of the product would expect to alter significantly during
feeding.
Rheological properties have been considered to be
important analytical tools to provide fundamental in-
sights on the structural organization of food and play
an important role in heat transfer. Foods are liquid,
solid and semi-solid. Some foods especially starches
and proteins undergo changes/modifications during pro-
cessing resulting in a viscous dispersion, solutions or gel
depending on temperature and concentration. Gener-
ally, fluids with suspended particles have a certain struc-
ture, which is sensitive to shear. Hence, steady-shear
viscosimetry is not ideally suited if one wants to probe
the rheological characteristics of an unperturbed disper-
sion. In oscillatory rheometry, the specimen is subjected
to a very small oscillatory stress, such that its structure
remains intact. The small-amplitude oscillatory (dy-
namic) tests (SAOS) have been commonly used to char-
acterize the viscoelastic behavior of foods and allow
researchers to relate dynamic rheological parameters
to the sampleÕs molecular structure and glass transition
temperatures (Gunasekaran & Ak, 2000). Furthermore,
an empirical relationship between complex viscosity and
steady shear viscosity known as the Cox–Merz rule (Cox
& Merz, 1958) allows estimating steady shear viscosity
for cases where its direct measurement is rather difficult.
In addition, relationship among various rheological
parameters is of interest to predict one from another
for process industries and food product development.
Though originally developed for synthetic polymers,
the Cox–Merz rule and/or its modified forms apply to
many liquid and semi-solid foods (Berland & Launay,
1995; Yu & Gunasekaran, 2001).
During thermal treatment, carbohydrates undergo
series of physical transitions and chemical transforma-
tions that are manifested by changes in their physical
properties including heat capacity, enthalpy and crystal-
linity (Biliaderis, 1990). Thermal analysis has been pro-
ven a powerful tool to monitor the thermal events and
provide invaluable insight into the phase transitions,
conformational behaviour and compositional modifica-
tion of foods. Since starch is quantitatively the most
important component of sweet potato root and, there-
fore, the thermal scanning of sweet potato puree could
provide the possible changes and insight of the sweet po-
tato starch during heat treatment. Limited research on
non-traditional infant foods and its rheological, thermal
analysis has been reported and, hence, it is quite interest-
ing to study the thermorheological characteristics of
sweet potato puree based infant food. The objectives
377
of this study were to: (1) investigate the dynamic and
flow rheology as a function of temperature; (2) applica-
bility of the Cox–Merz rule between steady shear viscos-
ity and its dynamic viscosity values at low shear rates
and, (3) calorimetric behaviour of sweet potato puree
based baby foods.
2. Material and methods
2.1. Infant food samples
Sweet potato puree based baby food sample manu-
factured by Heinz, Canada were purchased from a
departmental store at Ste Anne de Bellevue in the prov-
ince of Quebec, Canada. The samples studied were
bought as processed strained baby foods. Two lots were
randomly purchased to obtain a more accurate repre-
sentation of the product. After purchasing, the samples
were stored in a dry, cool, and minimal light environ-
ment until opened and refrigerated immediately after
opening. Each sample opened and studied within 12 h.
Total soluble solids (TSS) content and pH of the
sweet potato puree were measured by a refractrometer
(Atago, Japan) and a pH-meter (Accumet AB 15, Fisher
Scientific, Canada) respectively.
2.2. Dynamic rheological measurement
Dynamic rheological measurement of baby food sam-
ple was carried out in a controlled-stress rheometer (AR
2000, TA Instruments, New Castle, DE, USA) with at-
tached computer software (Rheology Advantage Data
Analysis Program, TA). A 60-mm parallel plate attach-
ment was used with a gap of 1000 lm. The AR 2000 Sys-
tem is based on efficient peltier temperature control and
temperature was precisely monitored. For each test, the
measured volume of thoroughly mixed sample (approx-
imately 2 mL) was placed at the bottom plate of the rhe-
ometer. The stress sweep tests at a frequency of 1 Hz
were carried out in order to determine the range of lin-
ear viscoelastic response under oscillatory shear condi-
tions. The frequency sweep measurements under
conditions of linear viscoelastic response were per-
formed at constant stress amplitude in the range of
0.1–10 Hz. The measurement temperature ranged be-
tween 5 and 80 °C. Each time new sample was used
for rheological measurement. All the rheological mea-
surements were carried out in duplicate. Data analysis
software was used to obtain experimental data (elastic,
viscous modulus, phase angle and complex viscosity).
For steady flow measurements, the rheometer was
programmed for the set temperature and equilibrated
for 10 min following which a programmed shear chang-
ing from 0.1 to 100 s
1 in 5 min. Rheological parameters
(shear stress, shear rate, apparent viscosity) were
378 J. Ahmed, H.S. Ramaswamy / Journal of Food Engineering 74 (2006) 376–382

obtained from the software. Various rheological flow 1000 100

G' A
models based on shear stress–shear rate were tested G''
(Newtonian, Bingham, Casson, power law, Herschel delta
Bulkley) and the best fit model was selected on the basis
of standard error, which is defined as:

G',G'' (Pa)

δ( )
o
Xh i0.5
100 10
2
ðX m
X c Þ =ðn
2Þ Range  1000 ð1Þ

where Xm is the measured value; Xc is the calculated

value; n is the number of data points and range is the
maximum value of Xm—the minimum value. 10 1
0.1 1 10
ω (Hz)
2.3. Differential scanning calorimetry
Fig. 1. Dependence of elastic G 0 , viscous G00 moduli, and phase angle,
A differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) (TA Q100, d for sweet potato puree based baby food.
TA Instruments, Newcastle, DE, USA) equipped with a
refrigerated cooling system, was used to determine the
endothermic characteristics of sweet potato puree. The Magnitudes of both G 0 and G00 increased with fre-
instrument was calibrated against the temperature and quency. The dynamic rheological data of ln G 0 and
heat flow of fusion of indium and sapphire standards. ln G00 versus ln x for sweet potato puree at selected
Nitrogen was used as purge gas at a flow rate of 50 mL/ temperatures (5–80 °C) were subjected to linear
min. Sweet potato puree samples (mg) were accurately regression (Rosalina & Bhattacharya, 2002; Yoo,
weighed into aluminium pans and hermetically sealed 2004). The slopes and intercepts of those curves are
to avoid any moisture loss during the analysis. Samples presented in Table 1. It is indicated from the Table
were subjected to a temperature scan from 0 to 100 °C, that G00 –x data fitted well (R2 > 0.84) as compared
at a rate of 5 °C/min. A four axis robotic device automat- to G 0 –x data (R2 > 0.47). The corresponding slopes
ically loads sample and reference pan of DSC. The DSC of those curves were ranged between 0.042–0.065
measurement was done in duplicate. The DSC data were and 0.142–0.199. This implied that elastic modulus
analyzed with the Universal Analysis Software (version was relatively independent of frequency while the vis-
3.6 C) (TA Instruments, Newcastle, NJ). cous modulus was dependent on frequency. This type
of behaviour is associated with weak gel formation.
Rosalina and Bhattacharya (2002) reported similar
3. Results and discussion behaviour during dynamic rheological measurement
of starch gel.
Total soluble solid of sweet potato puree was 11.2° Effects of temperature on elastic and viscous moduli
Brix while the pH was 5.27. The product specification of sweet potato sample are shown in Figs. 2 and 3,
(for 64 mL) provided by the manufacturer was: protein respectively. Values of G 0 and G00 were found to be in
0.7 g, fat 0.1 g, carbohydrate 11.0 g, starch 4.4 g, sodium the range of 146–319 and 22–73 Pa, respectively at tem-
6 mg and potassium 79 mg. The energy value was re- perature range of 5–80 °C. Values of G 0 decreased with
ported as 190 kJ. frequency from 5 to 80 °C except at 65 °C while G00 sys-
temically decreased. The starch gelatinization at 65 °C
3.1. Dynamic rheological characteristics could be the possible reason for increasing values of
G 0 . Earlier, Fasina et al. (2003) also reported lack of
Dynamic frequency sweep tests were performed in the
linear viscoelastic range to determine the frequency
dependence of the elastic and viscous moduli. Fig. 1 Table 1
illustrates the mechanical spectra describing the visco- Slopes and intercepts of ln G 0 and G00 versus ln x curves of sweet potato
elastic behavior of sweet potato puree subjected to puree based baby food
low-amplitude oscillatory deformation tests at 20 °C. Temperature G0 G00
The predominant response of the sample to the imposed (°C)
Slope Intercepts R 2
Slope Intercepts R2
deformation is the stored potential energy (characterized 5 0.051 5.57 0.82 0.199 3.40 0.92
by the predominance of the elastic modulus, G 0 , over the 20 0.050 5.45 0.72 0.171 3.32 0.91
viscous modulus, G00 ). The product behaved like an elas- 35 0.046 5.30 0.62 0.159 3.28 0.94
tic solid and supported by phase angle values. Fasina, 50 0.042 5.12 0.47 0.145 3.24 0.94
Walter, Fleming, and Simunovic (2003) reported similar 65 0.048 5.22 0.53 0.143 3.17 0.90
80 0.065 5.10 0.63 0.142 3.02 0.84
behaviour earlier for restructured sweet potato puree.
 J. Ahmed, H.S. Ramaswamy / Journal of Food Engineering 74 (2006) 376–382 379

1000 100
5 ºC 35 ºC

50 ºC 65 ºC
80 ºC
20 ºC
80 ºC
G/ (Pa)

τ (Pa)
10

100
0.1 1 10 100
ω (rad/s)

Fig. 2. Effect of temperature on elastic modulus of sweet potato puree

based baby food.
1
0.1 1 10 100
-1
γ (s )

100 Fig. 4. Shear stress–shear rate data of sweet potato puree based baby
5ºC 35 ºC food at selected temperature.

50 ºC 65 ºC

80 ºC
s ¼ s0 þ K c_ n ð2Þ
G// (Pa)

where s is the shear stress (Pa), s0 is the yield stress, c_

is the shear rate (s
1), K is the consistency coefficient
(Pa sn), and n is the flow behavior index (dimensionless).
The steady flow parameters of sweet potato puree are
reported in Table 2. The rheological parameters were af-
10 fected by temperature. The product exhibited yield stress
0.1 1 10 100 where as the values were varied insignificantly with tem-
ω (rad/s)
perature. The consistency coefficient (K) decreased
Fig. 3. Effect of temperature on viscous modulus of sweet potato puree systematically between 5 and 50 °C while an increasing
based baby food. trend was noticed at and above 65 °C. This type of
behaviour is common for cereal starches where the
pasting temperature (above gelatinization temperature)
trends of dynamic rheological parameter with tempera-
attains a peak viscosity and falls somewhat as tempera-
ture for pure sweet potato puree. The phenomenon
ture rise further (Woolfe, 1992). The flow behaviour
was explained on the basis of weak hydrogen bonding
index (n) ranged between 0.34 and 0.54 with no sys-
and strong hydrophobic interaction during thermal pro-
tematic trend with temperature. The sample showed
cessing and gel formation.
non-Newtonian shear-thinning behaviour (n < 1) with
The ratio of G00 and G 0 resulting tangent of phase
temperature. Sweet potato starch has a fairly high peak
angle (d), measuring energy loss compared to energy
and initial hot paste viscosity (commonly found between
stored in cyclic deformation. A phase angle of 90° indi-
58 and 80 °C), thinning rapidly on prolonged cooking at
cates the material is fully viscous while an elastic mate-
boiling temperature. Its peak viscosity is similar to that
rial is characterized by phase angle value approaches to
of cassava starches, lower than that of yam starches and
0°. A phase angle (d) of 6.70–15.96° was found to vary
higher than that of corn starch (Rasper, 1969).
between 5 and 80 °C that also supported the viscoelas-
ticity of sweet potato puree.
Table 2
3.2. Steady flow model Herschel–Bulkley model parameters of sweet potato puree based baby
food
Steady-shear flow curves of pureed sample at different Temperature (°C) s0 (Pa) K (Pa sn) n (–) SE
temperatures are shown in Fig. 4. Herschel Bulkley
5 1.76 1.13 0.34 20.9
model was used to describe the shear stress–shear rate 20 1.46 0.78 0.38 27.1
data compared to other models though the standard er- 35 0.54 0.48 0.50 32.7
rors exceeded the prescribed soft ware limits (SE < 20). 50 1.65 0.44 0.54 29.3
This is due to wider shear rate chosen and product nat- 65 0.82 0.80 0.53 35.5
80 1.35 1.52 0.51 36.6
ure. The Herschel Bulkley model is represented as:
380 J. Ahmed, H.S. Ramaswamy / Journal of Food Engineering 74 (2006) 376–382

3.3. Applicability of Cox–Merz rule between steady 1000 1000

shear and oscillation 20 ºC η∗
η
100 100
The empirical Cox–Merz rule (Cox & Merz, 1958)
states that the magnitudes of the complex viscosity (g )

η∗ (Pa.s)

η (Pa.s)
and the steady shear viscosity (g) must be superimposed 10 10
at equal values of frequency and shear rate (Eq. (3)).
Fig. 5 illustrates that the Cox–Merz rule does not fit
1 1
g and g plotted at equivalent values of shear rate
(0.1–10 s
1) and frequency range (0.1–10 Hz). Parallel
dependencies of g on shear rate and g on frequency 0.1 0.1
are obtained with the values of g higher than the g 0.1 1 10
values from continuous shear ramps. The rheological γ (s-1), ω (Hz)
properties of the investigated systems differ from those
1000 1000
of the polymer solutions and are more similar to those
η∗
of the structured systems. 50 ºC
η

jg jðxÞ ¼ gð_cÞjx¼_c ð3Þ 100 100

η∗ (Pa.s)
jgð_cÞj ¼ kg ðxÞjx¼_c ð4Þ

η (Pa.s)
10 10

where g and g are steady shear viscosity and complex vis-
cosity respectively, k is constants decided experimentally.
A generalized Cox–Merz relation (Eq. (4)) which was 1 1
earlier used for some similar commercial food products
(Bistany & Kokini, 1983) fitted well for sweet potato
0.1 0.1
puree. The applicability of generalized Cox–Merz rule 0.1 1 10
is shown in Fig. 6. With the introduction of constant k γ (s-1), ω (Hz)
(shift factor) (Table 3) in complex viscosity data the
steady shear viscosity superimposed those and fitted 1000 1000
80 ºC η∗
the Cox–Merz rule adequately (R2  0.996). The con-
η
stant k did not vary systematically with temperature. 100 100
Rao and Cooley (1992) demonstrated that tomato paste

η (Pa.s)
sample with yield stress also fitted the Cox–Merz rule
η∗ (Pa.s)

well. The non-fitting of the Cox–Merz rule for most of 10 10

the food products is attributed to structural decay due
to the extensive strain applied. Though applied strain 1 1
is low in SAOS, it is sufficient enough in steady shear
to break down structured inter and intra-molecular
associations (Gunasekaran & Ak, 2000). In the present 0.1 0.1
study, the sweet potato starch attributed towards starch 0.1 1 10
gelatinization and rearrangement of molecular associa- γ (s-1), ω (Hz)
tion during thermal treatment. Fig. 5. The comparison of the oscillatory and the continuous shear
behaviour for sweet potato puree based baby food samples at selected
3.4. Thermal characteristics temperature range.

DSC was used in an attempt to verify correspondence
of the rheological measurement with the structural
changes associated with the studied baby food. During
heating of baby food, starches (amylase and amylopec-
tin) and possibly some additives in association with
water exhibit order–disorder phase transitions (gelatini-
zation) (Fig. 7). Sweet potato puree exhibited peak
thermal transitions (Tmax) at 57 and 94.5 °C, respec-
tively. Sweet potato contains 75–80% amylopectin and
20–25% amylose and the first peak corresponds to the
gelatinization of the starches. Gelatinization of sweet
potato starch is of the single stage type (Shin & Ahn,
1983) and the range has earlier been reported to vary be-
tween 58 and 75 °C (Madamba, Bustrillos, & San Pedro,
1975) and 65 and 80 °C (Shin & Ahn, 1983). The second
thermal transition could be attributed by presence of
other ingredients and/or disorganization of amylose–
lipid complexes. The presence of amylase–lipid com-
plexes in starch systems is revealed by endothermic
transition at temperatures (95–130 °C) well above the
melting endotherm of starch crystallites (Kugimiya,
Donovan, & Wong, 1980).
 J. Ahmed, H.S. Ramaswamy / Journal of Food Engineering 74 (2006) 376–382 381

100 100 0
20 ºC
η∗κ
-1
η
10 10
η*k (Pa.s)

η (Pa.s)
57

Heat flow (W/g)

-2

1 1
-3

-4
0.1 0.1 94.5
0.1 1 10
γ (s-1), ω (Hz) -5
40 50 60 70 80 90 100
100 100 Temperature (˚C)
50 ºC η∗κ
η Fig. 7. Thermogram of sweet potato puree based baby food.

10 10
η*k (Pa.s)

4. Conclusions
η (Pa.s)

1 1 Sweet potato puree based baby foods exhibited vis-

coelastic behaviour with G 0 much greater than G00 at
all values of frequency. The magnitudes of both moduli
0.1 0.1 decreased with temperature with exception of G 0 at
0.1 1 10 65 °C. Steady shear data supported oscillatory measure-
γ (s-1), ω (Hz) ments and revealed that the pureed sample exhibited
shear thinning behaviour with flow index less than
100 100
unity. Steady shear viscosity and complex viscosity of
65 ºC
η∗κ baby food well fitted a modified the Cox–Merz rule
η
with the introduction of a frequency shift factor. Gela-
10 10 tinization of sweet potato and/or additives and intra-
η*k (Pa.s)

molecular association could be possible reasons for

η (Pa.s)

deviation of Cox–Merz rule. Two thermal peak transi-

1 1 tions (57 and 94.5 °C) were noticed for sweet potato
puree indicating starch gelatinization and a possible
amylase–lipid complex formation. DSC tests were use-
0.1 0.1 ful in explaining rheological behaviour of sweet potato
0.1 1 10 puree.
γ (s-1), ω (Hz)

Fig. 6. Modified Cox–Merz rule for sweet potato puree based baby
food.
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