RESUMO
This paper proposes a model for bubble growth in semi-hard cheese coupling mechanical behaviour and mass transport. The modelling follows previous work centred on the mechanical aspects, and focuses in this paper on the mass transport phenomena. Data are compared to experimental results obtained on industrial-size cheeses, both under the rind and at core, and a sensitivity study is conducted to discuss the results. The model is in agreement with experiment at core, and underlines the great influence of the carbon dioxide production rate and the amount of cheese material surrounding the bubble on bubble growth. Under the rind, the model yielded poorer agreement, due to the fact that this region in the cheese is less homogeneous, and therefore with more intra- and inter-batch variation on the parameters that were characterized.
