Crossflow microfiltration process for the separation of biotechnologically produced materials
First Claim
1. A crossflow microfiltration process for the separation of biotechnologically produced materials from a cell suspension comprising(A) passing a cell suspension containing biotechnologically produced materials through a tubular, polysulfone, polymeric, microfiltration membrane having an inner surface and an outer surface, in crossflow to said inner surface, wherein(a) said cell suspension flows through the tubular microfiltration membrane at about 3 to 6 meters per second,(b) said microfiltration membrane has micropores with a mean diameter of about 0.3 to 0.5 μ
- m,(c) said mircopores are about 0.15 to 0.85 times the size of cells in said cell suspension, and(d) there is a mean pressure gradient of about 2 bar between the inner surface of said microfiltration membrane and its outer surface,so that the materials to be separated pass through said microfiltration membrane as a filtrate and the cell suspension remaining becomes a concentrate; and
(B) recovering said filtrate.
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Abstract
The invention relates to a process for the separation of biotechnologically produced valuable materials form a cell suspension by crossflow microfiltration to obtain an high specific permeate flux while retention stays near 0% for long periods. To enable crossflow microfiltration to be carried out on an industrial scale in biotechnology in the separation of biotechnologically produced extracellular valuable materials from a cell suspension, particularly in the separation of alkaline protease for recovering enzyme, under economically acceptacle conditions, alkaline protease of relatively high molecular weight, more especially enzyme >20,000 daltons, is separated from a fermenter solution using polysulfone tubes having micropore diameters of from 0.3 to 0.5 μm at a rate of flow of the fermenter solution of from 3 to 6 m/s parallel to the membrane surface and with a pressure difference between the concentrate side and the permeate side of 2 bar, the ratio of the mean pore diameter of the membrane to the size of the microorganisms remaining in the concentrate being between 0.15 and 0.85
41 Citations
11 Claims
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1. A crossflow microfiltration process for the separation of biotechnologically produced materials from a cell suspension comprising
(A) passing a cell suspension containing biotechnologically produced materials through a tubular, polysulfone, polymeric, microfiltration membrane having an inner surface and an outer surface, in crossflow to said inner surface, wherein (a) said cell suspension flows through the tubular microfiltration membrane at about 3 to 6 meters per second, (b) said microfiltration membrane has micropores with a mean diameter of about 0.3 to 0.5 μ - m,
(c) said mircopores are about 0.15 to 0.85 times the size of cells in said cell suspension, and (d) there is a mean pressure gradient of about 2 bar between the inner surface of said microfiltration membrane and its outer surface, so that the materials to be separated pass through said microfiltration membrane as a filtrate and the cell suspension remaining becomes a concentrate; and (B) recovering said filtrate. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
- m,
Specification