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Design of fluidized‐bed fermentors
Author(s) -
Andrews G. F.,
Przezdziecki J.
Publication year - 1986
Publication title -
biotechnology and bioengineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.136
H-Index - 189
eISSN - 1097-0290
pISSN - 0006-3592
DOI - 10.1002/bit.260280605
Subject(s) - fluidized bed , biochemical engineering , chemistry , process engineering , engineering , waste management
Abstract Designing a fluidized‐bed bioreactor requires choosing the best support particle (if any). Effectiveness factors (proportional to reactor volumetric productivity) are derived for flocs, solid spherical supports, porous supports, and adsorbent supports. The derivation demonstrates a mathematical procedure for reducing the diffusion/uptake equations for many components (substrates and inhibitory products) to a single equation, and for identifying the limiting component. With solid supports there exists a film thickness that maximizes the effectiveness, and the design objective is to keep the film near this optimum throughout the bed. This involves consideration of the effect of support particle density and film growth on bed stratification. Other considerations in picking support particles are obtaining reasonable values for bed height and diameter, minimizing mass transfer resistance between liquid and biomass, and preventing surface shear from stripping off the biomass.