Investigation on the variation regularity of the characteristic droplet diameters in the swirling flow field

Application of a 3D printed miniaturized hydrocyclone in biopharmaceutical industry-numerical and experimental studies of yeast separation from fermentation culture media

Various industries ranging from water purification to pharmaceutical production have experienced multi separation steps that impose more process time and contamination possibility by batch operation. We propose a developed microfluidic particle sorter (miniaturized hydrocyclone) that adopts centrifugal force as it has ability to decline the number of separation steps and the risk of extrinsic contamination in continuous process. While biological industries have not relied on mini hydrocyclones considerably because of low efficiency and microfabrication difficulties, current work has been planned to conquer these obstacles. In this research, biomass separation from fermentation broth by 3 mm hydrocyclones was investigated. The effect of apex size, feed flow rate, hydrocyclone geometry were analyzed numerically in four mini-hydrocyclones. The most efficient mini-hydrocyclone was chosen to be made by elegant additive manufacturing technology and studied experimentally. The separation efficiency was achieved up to 90% while the concentration ratio of heavy stream (apex) to dilute stream (vortex finder) was reached more than twofold. The mini hydrocyclone performance in view of energy target was studied by Euler-Reynolds-Efficiency plots. The 4 μm cut size was achieved that is promising high throughput separation for biological particles.

Mechanism Investigation on a Novel Oil Recovery Skimmer Coupling Free Surface Vortex and Cyclone Separation

In consideration of offshore oil spill accidents, a mechanical method is a kind of widely used treatment methods to recover spilled oil at sea. It also has the advantages of low cost, convenient use, and environmental friendliness. In order to improve the recovery efficiency and oil content of liquid recovered, a novel mechanical spilled oil recovery philosophy coupling surface vortex and hydrocyclone separation was proposed, and a small-scale prototype was manufactured. Medium crude from Bohai oil field was applied as spilled oil to test the recovery property of the prototype skimmer. The experiment results show that the novel skimmer is able to recover spilled oil effectively on the sea surface and speed up the process of recovery. Pressure of overflow pipe is sensitive to pump frequency, flow rate of inlet, and split ratio. In addition, oil content at the overflow port is influenced by spilled oil amount on the surface and split ratio. Besides, linear relationship is found between the recovery efficiency and the split ratio. The experimental study can provide a technical reference for the treatment of a small amount of spilled oil on the water surface and also has great significance for the design of spilled oil recovery equipment.