By Robert J Keefe, Niro Inc/GEA Filtration
and David M Dubbin, GEA Process Engineering Ltd - Niro
In the food, pharmaceutical and chemical industries, microfiltration via ceramic membranes is used for the efficient recovery of a wide range of products from fermentation biomass. In biotech operations, the technology has emerged as an effective method for separating enzymes from fermented mixtures, because it holds back the whole cells and allows the enzyme to pass through and be recovered in the permeate stream.
When compared to traditional separation techniques such as centrifugation and rotary vacuum filtration, microfiltration is much more economically viable. In fact, crossflow membrane filtration can replace a two step process with one, resulting in lower investment and operating costs, higher enzyme yields and simplification of downstream processing methods.
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