Finite element modeling for spatial moisture content distribution during ripening of Camembert cheese

Listeria monocytogenes is a food-borne pathogen that can survive and grow during ripening of Camembert, a soft cheese. During the ripening phase, the pH and spatial moisture content continually change, which impacts the growth of Listeria monocytogenes. Development and verification of pH model during ripening phase has been reported already. Therefore, the objective of this study was to develop and verify a moisture content distribution model for the ripening phase of Camembert cheese. A finite element model (FEM) was developed for moisture content distribution during ripening of Camembert cheese. With the initial condition and the boundary conditions, the MATLAB-based FEM was used to calculate the moisture content at six locations: top center (TC), top surface (TS), left center (LC), right center (RC), bottom center (BC), and bottom surface (BS). The FEM showed good agreement with the mean moisture content measured values. The standard error of the predicted moisture content values ranged from 0.0001 to 0.01 g/g. The maximum absolute moisture content difference at six locations during ripening duration was 0.04 g/g. Together, the pH and moisture content models can be integrated with a dynamic predictive growth model to enable the prediction of survival and growth of Listeria monocytogenes during ripening of Camembert cheese.