Membrane technologies for recovery of bioactive compounds

Membrane-based operations represent well-established technologies in food processing industries due to their intrinsic properties including no use of chemical additives, possibility to operate at ambient temperature, easy scale-up, modularity and low energy consumption. Pressure-driven membrane operations represent also a valid approach for the recovery purification and concentration of bioactive compounds from agro-food by-products and wastewaters contributing to reduce the cost of their disposal and providing new high added-value products for new market trends within the logic of the circular economy. In this chapter technological implications of these processes in the recovery of bioactive compounds from agro-food by-products and more precisely from dairy, cereal and wine processing industries are analysed and discussed.