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Fakultät Bio- und Chemieingenieurwesen
PhD candidate

M. Sc. Vincent Backhaus

Rotating Packed Beds

03/01/2025 - 02/29/2028

The high viscosity of carbohydrate-rich residue streams causes difficult reaction conditions, especially due to poor mass transfer to the catalyst surface. Therefore, this project focuses on the investigation of rotating packed beds to increase mass transfer in the reaction of carbohydrate-rich residue streams.

Description

Residual biomass streams can be a great opportunity to replace fossil based chemicals and products. This biomass can be transformed to various carbohydrates that act as platform chemicals to produce everyday products, such as plastic polymers. [1]
The high viscosity of carbohydrate solutions is a challenge for handling and mass transfer during reactions. Enhancing mass transfer by rotational acceleration, rotating packed beds (RPBs) are used in absorption and distillation to intensify the process [2,3].

This project aims to apply the RPB concept to the reaction of carbohydrate solutions as a novel reactor system to overcome the transport limitations of the reaction. The project involves the design of the RPB reactor system as part of the AUFBRUCH graduate cluster. In collaboration to the research groups of Wohlgemuth and Palkovits, we aim at finding an optimized process including optimized catalyst and downstream processing, while focusing the potential environmental impact of the new reactor system.

References

[1] A. Ruppert, K. Weinberg, R. Palkovits: “Hydrogenolysis Goes Bio: From Carbohydrates and Sugar Alcohols to Platform Chemicals”, Angewandte Chemie International Edition 51 (2012) 2564 – 2601.
[2] J. Koop, N. Bera, E. Quickert, M. Schmitt, M. Schlüter, C. Held, G. Schembecker: “Separation of Volatile Organic Compounds from Viscous Liquids with RPB Technology”, Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research 62 (2023) 13637 – 13645.
[3] M. Jassim, G. Rochelle, D. Eimer, C. Ramshaw: “Carbon Dioxide Absorption and Desorption in Aqueous Monoethanolamine Solutions in a Rotating Packed Bed”, Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research 46 (2007) 2823 – 2833.