The role of membranes, conceived in the past just as selective barriers between two phases, has gained today an impressive revaluation and broadening in several areas of industry and technology. When we talk about membranes, indeed, we do not deal anymore with static structures whose primary role is to simply avoid substances' passage from one side to the other of them, but we mean systems whose action is still conceptually simple, but that are characterized by structures highly complex, capable to fine control the transport of molecules selectively, contributing in some cases also to their chemical transformations or optimizing mass and energy transfer between phases. Nevertheless, membranes and membrane operations, even integrated, are intrinsically characterised by features such as efficiency and operational simplicity, high selectivity and permeability for the transport of specific components, compatibility between different membrane operations in integrated systems, low energetic requirement, good stability under operating conditions and environment compatibility, easy control and scale-up, and large operational flexibility, that lead them to be an interesting answer for the rationalization of chemical productions. Definitely, membrane technology is a "clean technology" that is globally obtaining increasing consideration as a powerful tool for achieving the needs of "the process intensification strategy" for a sustainable growth. According to this, in the last years membranes science has become a multidisciplinary area, covering a spreading part of chemistry, chemical-, processes-, and material-engineering; membrane technology has thus been introduced in numerous industrial processes directly in the productive cycles, as key step for increasing the overall production's efficiency by accomplishing specific operations, and/or for the treatment of industrial waters and wastewaters, for recycling and reuse; only some examples are: chemical industry (separations processes), biotech industry (protein purification and separation from fermentation broths), textile industry, petrol-chemical and mechanical industry, agro-food industry (dairy, fruit and vegetables, sugars, meat, beverage, etc.). Moreover, membranes are the dominant technology in large scale water desalination for contributing to solve the global problem of water shortage; furthermore, the development of innovative membrane-based devices and the engineering of new nanostructures allowing to separation at nano-scale level, has lead to use them in some high-tech areas; recent applications are membrane contactors (controlled bio-crystallizations; emulsification at nano-scale; controlled gasification/degasification); catalytic reactors and bio-reactors; phase transfer catalysis; applications in pharmacy industry (both production processes and devices for controlled release of active substances), microelectronics (production of ultra pure water, high efficient sensors), biotech applications (self-assembling bio-molecules, tissue engineering and bio-artificial organs); new power generation devices (proton exchange membranes for fuel cells).
Procédés à membranes en industrie: État de l'art des applications et perspectives
Drioli E;Di Profio;
2006
Abstract
The role of membranes, conceived in the past just as selective barriers between two phases, has gained today an impressive revaluation and broadening in several areas of industry and technology. When we talk about membranes, indeed, we do not deal anymore with static structures whose primary role is to simply avoid substances' passage from one side to the other of them, but we mean systems whose action is still conceptually simple, but that are characterized by structures highly complex, capable to fine control the transport of molecules selectively, contributing in some cases also to their chemical transformations or optimizing mass and energy transfer between phases. Nevertheless, membranes and membrane operations, even integrated, are intrinsically characterised by features such as efficiency and operational simplicity, high selectivity and permeability for the transport of specific components, compatibility between different membrane operations in integrated systems, low energetic requirement, good stability under operating conditions and environment compatibility, easy control and scale-up, and large operational flexibility, that lead them to be an interesting answer for the rationalization of chemical productions. Definitely, membrane technology is a "clean technology" that is globally obtaining increasing consideration as a powerful tool for achieving the needs of "the process intensification strategy" for a sustainable growth. According to this, in the last years membranes science has become a multidisciplinary area, covering a spreading part of chemistry, chemical-, processes-, and material-engineering; membrane technology has thus been introduced in numerous industrial processes directly in the productive cycles, as key step for increasing the overall production's efficiency by accomplishing specific operations, and/or for the treatment of industrial waters and wastewaters, for recycling and reuse; only some examples are: chemical industry (separations processes), biotech industry (protein purification and separation from fermentation broths), textile industry, petrol-chemical and mechanical industry, agro-food industry (dairy, fruit and vegetables, sugars, meat, beverage, etc.). Moreover, membranes are the dominant technology in large scale water desalination for contributing to solve the global problem of water shortage; furthermore, the development of innovative membrane-based devices and the engineering of new nanostructures allowing to separation at nano-scale level, has lead to use them in some high-tech areas; recent applications are membrane contactors (controlled bio-crystallizations; emulsification at nano-scale; controlled gasification/degasification); catalytic reactors and bio-reactors; phase transfer catalysis; applications in pharmacy industry (both production processes and devices for controlled release of active substances), microelectronics (production of ultra pure water, high efficient sensors), biotech applications (self-assembling bio-molecules, tissue engineering and bio-artificial organs); new power generation devices (proton exchange membranes for fuel cells).I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
