Water uptake and drying of a barley grain

Barley is an important ingredient for the production of alcoholic beverages, such as, whisky or beer. The uptake of water and drying process of its grains effects the formation of flavours during the fermentation. MR Microscopy is a unique tool to investigate the water distribution inside a barely grain over a period of time. For the experiment, a barley grain was placed in a micro5 probe. The image time series of the grain clearly show, how the water supplied via a wet cloth on the right hand side of the images, increased and distributed in the grain and then dried again in an externally applied air flow. Bright intensities indicate areas with high concentrations of mobile water.