Numerical simulation of convective and diffusive transport effects on a high‐pressure‐induced inactivation process

High‐pressure‐induced conversions, such as the inactivation of enzymes or of microorganisms, are dependent on the applied pressure and the temperature of the process. The former can be considered to be a spatially homogeneous quantity, while the latter, being a transport quantity, varies over space and time. Here we question whether the uniformity of a high‐pressure conversion can be disturbed by convective and conductive heat and mass transport conditions. Enzyme inactivation is taken as a model process for a high‐pressure conversion. To cover a broad range of parameters and to consider scale‐up effects, the investigation is based on mathematical modeling and numerical simulation for different sizes of the pressure chamber and different solvent viscosities. Apart from viscosity, the physical properties of the enzyme solutions are assumed to be identical in all cases. Therefore, matrix effects other than that of viscosity are excluded. Moreover, the authors postulate that viscosity solely acts on the continuum mechanical scale of momentum exchange but not on the molecular scale on the inactivation kinetics. It has been found that nonuniform thermal conditions can strongly influence the result of a high‐pressure process. A variation of the activity retention between 28% and 48% can be observed after 20 minutes for a 0.8‐L high‐pressure chamber and a matrix fluid with a viscosity comparable to that of edible oils. The same process carried out in a 6.3‐L device leads to an activity retention that varies between 16% and 40%. From the analysis of the time scales for the inactivation and for hydrodynamic and thermal compensation, it can be deduced that a nonuniform activity retention has to be expected if the inactivation time scale is larger than the hydrodynamic time scale and smaller than the thermal compensation time scale. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Biotechnol Bioeng 79: 94–104, 2002