Cantaloupes (Cucumis melo) have many potential health benefits due to their high amount of carotenoids and vitamin C. The objective of this study was to develop cantaloupe fruit juice powder with foam mat drying technology. For this purpose, foaming conditions of cantaloupe was optimized using response surface methodology (RSM) and the effects of drying temperature and foam thickness on drying behavior were investigated. The independent variables for RSM were egg white (EW) powder (1-3% w/w) as foaming agent, xanthan gum (XG) concentration (0.05–0.2% w/w) as foam stabilizer and whipping time (WT) (2-10 min). The optimum conditions for minimizing the foam density (FD) and drainage volume (DV) as responses to foam mat drying of cantaloupe were found to be EW 3% w/w, XG concentration 0.17% w/w and WT 8.80 min. To evaluate drying behavior of the optimized foam, drying was carried out in a batch type thin layer dryer at 3 drying temperatures (40, 55 and 70 0C) on 3 and 5 mm thicknesses of foamed samples. Ten thin-layer drying models were evaluated in the kinetics research. Based on the obtained results, the highest values of R2 and lowest values of χ2 and RMSE were obtained with the Weibull distribution model. Moreover, Fick’s second law was employed to calculate the effective moisture diffusivity that varied from 3.283×10-9 to 9.483×10-9 m2/s and from 4.053×10-9 to 1.216×10-8 m2/s with activation energy values of 31.714 and 33.043 kJ/mol for foam thicknesses of 3 and 5 mm, respectively.

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