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Moisture is the presence of a liquid, especially water, often in trace amounts. Small amounts of water may be found, for example, in the air (
humidity Humidity is the concentration of water vapor present in the air. Water vapor, the gaseous state of water, is generally invisible to the human eye. Humidity indicates the likelihood for precipitation, dew, or fog to be present. Humidity depe ...
), in foods, and in some commercial products. Moisture also refers to the amount of
water vapor (99.9839 °C) , - , Boiling point , , - , specific gas constant , 461.5 J/( kg·K) , - , Heat of vaporization , 2.27 MJ/kg , - , Heat capacity , 1.864 kJ/(kg·K) Water vapor, water vapour or aqueous vapor is the gaseous pha ...
present in the air.


Moisture control in products

Control of moisture in products can be a vital part of the process of the product. There is a substantial amount of moisture in what seems to be
dry matter The dry matter or dry weight is a measurement of the mass of something when completely dried. Analysis of food The dry matter of plant and animal material consists of all its constituents excluding water. The dry matter of food includes carboh ...
. Ranging in products from cornflake cereals to washing powders, moisture can play an important role in the final quality of the product. There are two main aspects of concern in moisture control in products: allowing too much moisture or too little of it. For example, adding some water to cornflake cereal, which is sold by weight, reduces costs and prevents it from tasting too dry, but adding too much water can affect the crunchiness of the cereal and the freshness because water content contributes to bacteria growth. Water content of some foods is also manipulated to reduce the number of
calories The calorie is a unit of energy. For historical reasons, two main definitions of "calorie" are in wide use. The large calorie, food calorie, or kilogram calorie was originally defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of on ...
. Moisture has different effects on different products, influencing the final quality of the product.
Wood pellet Pellet fuels (or pellets) are biofuels made from compressed organic matter or biomass. Pellets can be made from any one of five general categories of biomass: industrial waste and co-products, food waste, agricultural residues, energy crops, and ...
s, for instance, are made by taking remainders of wood and grinding them to make compact pellets, which are sold as a fuel. They need to have a relatively low water content for combustion efficiency. The more moisture that is allowed in the pellet, the more smoke that will be released when the pellet is burned. The need to measure water content of products has given rise to a new area of science,
aquametry Aquametry in analytical chemistry refer to analytical processes to measure the water present in materials. The methods widely used in aquametry encompasses Karl Fischer titration, distillation, chromatography In chemical analysis, chromatogr ...
. There are many ways to measure moisture in products, such as different wave measurement (light and audio),
electromagnetic field An electromagnetic field (also EM field or EMF) is a classical (i.e. non-quantum) field produced by (stationary or moving) electric charges. It is the field described by classical electrodynamics (a classical field theory) and is the classical c ...
s, capacitive methods, and the more traditional weighing and drying technique.


See also

* Damp (structural) *
Dry matter The dry matter or dry weight is a measurement of the mass of something when completely dried. Analysis of food The dry matter of plant and animal material consists of all its constituents excluding water. The dry matter of food includes carboh ...
*
Humidor A humidor is a humidity-controlled box or room used primarily for storing cigars, cigarettes, cannabis, or pipe tobacco. Either too much or too little humidity can be harmful to tobacco products; a humidor's primary function is to maintain a ste ...
*
Water content Water content or moisture content is the quantity of water contained in a material, such as soil (called soil moisture), rock, ceramics, crops, or wood. Water content is used in a wide range of scientific and technical areas, and is expressed as ...


References

{{Authority control Hydrology