The main objective of this study was to compare the goodness of fit of five non-linear growth models, i.e. Brody, Gompertz, Logistic, Richards and von Bertalanffy in different animals. It also aimed to evaluate the influence of the shape parameter on the growth curve. To accomplish this task, published growth data of 14 different groups of animals were used and four goodness of fit statistics were adopted: coefficient of determination (R 2), root mean square error (RMSE), Akaike information criterion (AIC) and Bayesian information criterion (BIC). In general, the Richards growth equation provided better fits to experimental data than the other models. However, for some animals, different models exhibited better performance. It was obtained a possible interpretation for the shape parameter, in such a way that can provide useful insights to predict animal growth behavior.

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This work presents a study of solid–liquid equilibrium of sucrose in three different binary liquid mixtures, methanol–ethanol, methanol–water, and ethanol–water for the temperatures of 303 and 313 K covering the whole composition range of the binary liquid solution. The data are presented as a function of the dielectric constant of the binary liquid mixture taking into account the self-association of water and alcohol. From a dissolution phenomenon standpoint, it seems that the temperature is more important than the dielectric constant of the binary liquid solution for the solubility mechanism. For each temperature, it was observed that the sucrose solubility is directly proportional to the dielectric constant of the binary liquid mixture.

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Mathematical models are often used to predict microbial growth in food products. An important class of these models involves the adaptation of classical sigmoid functions, such as the Gompertz and logistic functions. This study aimed to validate the use of the modified Richards model in various situations, which have not previously been tested. The model was obtained through solving a system of two differential equations and could be applied to both isothermal and non-isothermal environments. To test and validate this model, we used published datasets containing data for the growth of Pseudomonas spp. in fish products. The results obtained after fitting the model showed that it could be effectively used to describe and predict the Pseudomonas growth curves under various temperature regimens. However, the influence of the shape parameter on the growth curve is an issue that needs further evaluation.

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