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Chapter 1 Separation processes - an overview A. S. GRANDISON and M. J. LEWIS, Department of Food Science and Technology, The University of Reading, Whiteknights, PO Box 226, Reading, RG6 6AP 1.1 FOODS - THE RAW MATERIAL Food and drink play a vital role in all our lives, providing us with the nutrients essential for all our daily activities, including cell maintenance, growth and reproduction. Although foods are commonplace and much taken for granted, their composition and structure are by no means simple. Firstly, all foods are chemical in nature. For most foods the principal component is water and this water plays an important role in the overall behaviotir of that food. One of the most important branches of separation is the removal of water, to save transportation costs and improve microbial stability. The other components can be classified into major components, such as protein, fat or lipid, sugars, starch and fibre. The minor components include the minerals, which are known collectively as ash, vitamins and organic acids. Information on food composition and the amounts of major and minor components can be found in the Composition of Foods Tables (Paul and Southgate, 1978). Table 1.1. illustrates just some of the compo- sition data that is available, for a selection of foods. Food composition tables are useful in that they provide an average composition. However, some of their limitations are illtistrated below, taking milk as an example. It should be noted that similar points could be made about most other foods. Milk is extremely complex in terms of its chemical composition, containing protein, fat, carbohydrate, minerals and vitamins. There are many different proteins, which can be subdivided into the whey proteins, which are in true solution in the aqueous phase, and the caseins, which are in the colloidal form. The fat itself is a complex mixture of triglycerides and, being immiscible with water, is dispersed as small droplets, stabilised by a membrane, within the milk. The vitamins are classified as water or fat soluble, depending on which phase they most associate with. Some of the minerals, such as calcium and phosphorus, partition between the aqueous phase and the colloidal casein and play a major role in the stability of the colloidal dispersion. In addition, there are many other components present in trace amounts, which may affect its delicate flavour 2 A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis Table 1.1. Composition of foods (weight/100 g) Milk Apple Peas Flour Beef Cod water (g) 87.6 (87.8) 85.6 78.5 13.0 74.0 82.1 protein (g) 3.3 ( 3.2) 0.3 5.8 9.8 20.3 17.4 fat (€9 3.8 ( 3.9) tr. 0.4 1.2 4.6 0.7 starch (g) 0.0 ( 0.0) 0.4 6.6 78.4 - sugar (g) 4.7 ( 4.8) 9.2 4.0 1.7 0.0 0.0 fibre (8) 0.0 ( 0.0) 2.4 5.2 3.4 - sodium (mg) 50( 55) 2 1 2 61 77 - potassium (mg) 150(140) 120 340 140 350 320 calcium (mg) 120 (1 15) 4 15 150 7 16 iron (mg) 0.05 (0.06) 0.3 1.9 2.2 2.1 0.3 phosphorus (mg) 95 ( 92) 16 100 130 180 170 vitamin C (mg) 1.50 (1.0) 15 25 vitamin B 1 (mg) 0.04 (0.06) 0.04 0.32 0.33 0.07 0.08 vitamin B6 (mg) 0.04 (0.06) 0.03 0.16 0.15 0.32 0.33 - - - tr tr vitamin D (ug) 0.03 (0.03) - - - vitamin E (mg) 0.10 (0.09) 0.2 tr tr 0.15 0.44 * flour - household plain tr - trace These values are taken from Paul and Southgate (1978). Figures in parentheses are for milk, taken from McCance and Widdowson¡¯s Coniposiiion of Foods Tables (5th edn) (1991), Royal Society of Chemistry, MAFF. There are slight differences between the reported results. and processing characteristics and nutritional value, such as trace minerals, organic acids and non-protein nitrogen compounds such as peptides, urea and amino acids. Walstra and Jenness (1984) have listed over 60 components present in milk, at levels that can be readily detected. Milk is also potentially a very unstable material. For example the pro- tein can be made to coagulate by a variety of methods, including heating, addition of the enzyme rennet, acid, salts and ethanol. Also the fat globules rise to the surface under the influence of gravity. Superimposed on this complex composition is the fact that it is subject to wide variation. Milks from different species differ markedly, and many types of milk other than cow¡¯s are consumed worldwide, e.g. sheep, goat, buffalo, camel. Within the same species there are large differences between breeds, and even between individual animals in the same herd. In addition to this, and of prime importance to the milk-processing industry, milk from the same animals is subject to wide seasonal variation, reflecting the change in the animals¡¯ diet throughout the year, and the stage of lactation. Factors relating to the handling of milk, such as the pH or the amount of dissolved oxygen, are also important to its stability. Foods may also be contaminated with matter from their production environment, i.e. soil, water and farmyard. For example milk may be contaminated with dirt, straw, anti- biotics, growth hormones, heavy metals, or radionuclides. Separation processes - an overview 3 In chemical terms alone, there is a great deal of scope for separating the components in milk and some examples are listed: water removal to produce evaporated or dried products; fat separation to produce creams and butter; protein separation to produce cheese or protein concentrates; calcium removal to improve stability; lactose removal, as a specialised ingredient or for low-lactose products; removal of components responsible for tainting raw milk or the cooked flavour of heat-treated milk products; removal of radionuclides from milk. In plant products pesticides and herbicides may additionally be present. Some foods, particularly of plant origin, also contain natural toxins, for example oxalic acid in rhubarb, and trypsin inhibitors, phytates and haemagglutinins in many legumes, cyanogenic glycosides in cassava and glucosinolates in rapeseed (Watson, 1987; Jones, 1992). However, the activity of most of these is reduced during normal processing and cooking methods. Foods also contain active enzyme systems. For example, raw milk contains phosphatase, lipases and proteases, xanthine oxidase and many others. Fruits and vegetables contain polyphenol oxidases and peroxidases, both of which cause colour changes in foods, particularly browning, and lipoxygenases, which produce rancid off- flavours (Nagodawithana and Reed, 1993). Therefore foods and wastes produced during food processing provide the raw material for extraction of enzymes and other important biochemicals with a range of applications, especially in the food and pharmaceuticals industries. Some examples are listed in Table 1.2. In the biotechnology industry, similar components may be produced by fermentation or enzymatic reactions and require extraction and purification. Perhaps the simplest example is alcohol, produced by a yeast fermentation, where the alcohol concentration that can be produced is limited to about 15 to 20%, as it inhibits further yeast metabolism. Alcohol can be recovered and concentrated by distillation. For low-alcohol or alcohol- free beers and wines, there is a requirement to remove alcohol. Again distillation or membrane techniques can be used. A wide range of food additives and medical compounds are produced by fermentation; these include many enzymes, such as proteases for milk clotting or detergent cleaners, amino acids such as glutamic acid for monosodium glutamate (MSG) production, aspartic acid and phenylalanine for aspartame, and lysine for nutritional supplements, organic acids such as citric, gluconic and lactic, and hydrocolloids, such as xanthan gum for stabilising or thickening foods, and a wide range of antibiotics and other medicinal compounds. In most cases it is necessary to purify these materials from dilute raw materials, which often requires sophisticated separation techniques. In fact a large proportion of the activities of the biotechnology industry is concerned with separations of this nature, which is known as downstream processing. In general, the products produced by bio- processing applications are more valuable than food products, and it is economically feasible to apply more complex separation techniques. 4 A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis Table 1.2. Biochemicals extracted from foods and by products Source Product Application Papaya Papain Meat tenderisation Beer haze removal Calf stomach Rennet Cheesemaking Barley Amylase Glucose syrup production Pancreas Insulin Control of diabetes Connective tissue Gelatin Gelling agent Egg Lysozyme Food preservative Soybean Lecithin Emulsifier Horseradish Peroxidase Diagnostics Milk Lactoperoxidase Antibacterial Egg Ovotransferrin Antibacterial Baking Most foods also come contaminated with microorganisms, derived from the environ- ment where they are produced, such as soil, water or the farmyard. These will cause food to spoil or decay, or in the case of pathogenic organisms, cause food poisoning, either directly or by producing toxins. Their activity needs to be controlled. Foods can be pasteurised, blanched, sterilised, and irradiated to control such activity. For liquid products microorganisms can also be removed by membrane sterilisation techniques. However, it is not only the chemical nature of the food that is important; the organisation and structure of components, and hence the physical properties, are vital considerations to the application of separation techniques. For example, the composition of apples as shown in Table 1.1 appears to be relatively simple. However, to fabricate (create) an apple in the laboratory from these components would be technically impossible. Large differences occur between apples in terms of their colour, flavour and texture which are not apparent from composition tables. Similar considerations apply to many other raw materials. Unfortunately for the food processor, nature does not provide materials of uniform chemical or physical properties. Foods have important physical properties, which will influence the separation technique that is to be selected; some of these are listed in Table 1.3. In addition, the structure of both raw materials and processed foods is very varied. They may exist as emulsions or colloids. They may be non- homogeneous on a macroscopic or microscopic scale, possessing fibrous structure and cellular structure, or layered structures such as areas of fat in meat. Foods are found as solids or liquids, but gas is frequently incorporated. This may be desirable, as in processed foods such as ice cream, bread or carbonated drinks. However, it may be desirable to remove dissolved gases from liquids such as oxygen or cellular gases from fruit and vegetables before certain processing operations. This brief introduction has aimed to illustrate the diverse nature of foods and related biological materials, and give an insight into their composition and structure. It is this Separation processes - an overview 5 complexity and diversity which provides the scope and potential for separating selected components from foods. Table 1.3. Examples of physical properties of foods, and separation processes to which they relate Physical property Separation technique Size, size distribution, shape Screening, air classification Density Centrifugation Viscosity Liquid extraction processes Rheological Expression Surface properties Froth flotation Thermal properties Evaporation, drying Electrical Electrostatic sorting Diffusional Extraction Solubility Solvent extraction Optical Reflectance (colour) sorting Membrane separations Thermal denaturation 1.2 SEPARATION TECHNIQUES 1.2.1 Introduction Separation of one or more components from a complex mixture is a requirement for many operations in the food and biotechnology industries. The components in question range from particulate materials down to small molecules. The separations usually aim to achieve removal of specific components, in order to increase the added value of the products, which may be the residue, the extracted components or both. All separations rely on exploiting differences in physical or chemical properties of the mixture of compo- nents. Some of the more common properties involved in separation processes are particle or molecular size and shape, density, solubility and electrostatic charge. These properties are discussed in more detail elsewhere (Mohsenin, 1980, 1984; Lewis, 1990). In some operations, more than one of these properties are involved. However, most of the processes involved are of a physical nature. Separation from solids or liquids involves the transfer of selected components across the boundary of the food. In many processes another stream or phase is involved, for example in extraction processes. However, this is not always so, for example expression, centrifugation or filtration. In expression, fruit juice or oil is squeezed from the food by application of pressure. In centrifugation, fat can be separated from water due to their density differences, by the application of a centrifugal force. In filtration there is a physical barrier to the transfer of certain components and the liquid is forced through the barrier by pressure, whilst the solids are retained. The resistance to flow will change throughout the filtration process, due to solids build-up. It can be seen that main driving 6 forces in these applications are pressure and density differences. As for all processes, separation rates are very important and these are affected by the size of the driving forces involved. In situations where a second phase or stream is involved, mass-transfer considerations become important; these involve the transfer of components within the food to the boundary, the transfer across the boundary and into the bulk of the extraction solvent. It is also important to increase the interfacial area exposed to the solvent. Therefore, size reduction, interfacial phenomena, txbulence and diffusivities all play a role in these processes. In many applications this additional stream is a liquid, either water or an organic solvent; more recently supercritical fluids, such as carbon dioxide, have been investigated (see Chapter 2). However, in hot-air drying the other phase is hot air, which supplies the energy and removes the water. Mass-transfer considerations are important also in some membrane applications and adsorption processes, where the additional stream is a solid. Other examples of driving force are concentration differences and chemical potential, which are involved in these operations (Loncin and Merson, 1979; Gekas, 1992). In some processes, both heat and mass transfer processes are involved. This is especially so for separation reactions involving a change of phase, such as evaporation or sublimation. Heat is required to cause vaporisation for evaporation, dehydration and distillation processes. Water has a much higher latent heat of vaporisation (2257 kJ/kg) than most other organic solvents. With solid foods the rate of heat transfer through the food may limit the overall process; for example in freeze-drying the process is usually limited by rate of heat transfer through the dry layer. Separation processes may be batch or continuous. A single separation process, for example a batch extraction, involves the contact of the solvent with the food. Initially concentration gradients are high and the rate of extraction is also high. The extraction rate falls exponentially and eventually an equilibrium state is achieved when the rate becomes zero. The extraction process may be accelerated by size reduction, inducing turbulence and increasing the extraction temperature. Equilibrium is achieved either when all the material has been extracted, in situations where the volume of solvent is well in excess of the solute or when the solvent becomes saturated with the solute, i.e. when the solubility limit has been achieved, when there is an excess of solute over the solvent. However, the attainment of equilibrium may take some considerable time. Batch reactions may operate far away from equilibrium or close to it. Equilibrium data is important in that it provides information on the best conditions that can be achieved at the prevailing conditions. Equilibrium data is usually determined at fixed conditions of temperature and pressure. Some important types of equilibrium data are: solubility data for extraction processes; vapour/liquid equilibrium data for fractional distillation; partition data for selective extraction processes; water sorption data for drying. Continuous processes may be single- or multiple-stage processes. The stages them- selves may be discrete entities, for example a series of stirred tank reactors, or there may A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis Separation processes -an overview 7 be many stages built into one unit of equipment, for example a distillation column or a screw extractor. The flow of the two streams can either be co-current or counter-current, although counter-current is normally favoured as it tends to give a more uniform driving force over the length of the reactor as well as a higher average driving force over the reactor. In some instances a combination of co-current and counter-current may be used; for example in hot air drying, the initial process is co-current to take advantage of the high initial driving rates, whereas the final drying is counter-current to permit drying to a lower moisture content. Continuous equipment usually operates under steady state conditions, i.e. the driving force changes over the length of the equipment, but at any particular location it remains constant with time. However, when the equipment is first started, it may take some time to achieve steady-state. During this transition period it is said to be operating under unsteady state conditions. In continuous processes the flow may be either streamline or turbulent. Consideration should be taken of residence times and distribution of residence times within the separation process; the two extremes of behaviour are plug flow, with no distribution of residence times, through to a well-mixed situation, with an infinite distribution of residence times. More detailed analysis of residence time distributions is provided by Levenspiel (1972). How close the process operates to equilibrium depends upon the operating conditions, flow rates of the two phases, time and temperature. These conditions affect the efficiency of the process, such as the recovery and the size of equipment required. Finally, all rates of reaction are temperature dependent. Physical processes are no exception, although activation energies are usually much lower than for chemical reaction rates. Using higher temperatures normally increases separation rates. However, there are limitations with biological materials: higher temperatures increase degradation reactions, causing colour and flavour changes, enzyme inactivation, protein denaturation, loss of functionality and a reduction in nutritional value. Safety issues with, respect to microbial growth may also need to be considered. A brief overview of separation methods is now considered in this chapter, based primarily on the nature of the material or stream subjected to the separation process, i.e. whether it is solid, liquid or gaseous. Other possible classifications are based on unit operations; e.g. filtration, evaporation, dehydration etc. or types of phase contact, such as solid-Iiquid or gas-liquid contacting processes. More detailed descriptions of conventiopal techniques can be found elsewhere -e.g. Brennan et at. (1990), Perry and Green (1984), King (1982). 1.2.2 Separations from solids Most solid foods are particulate in nature, with particles having a large variety of shapes and sizes. Separations involving solids fall into two categories. The first is where it is required to separate or segregate the particles; such processes are classified as solid-solid separations. The second is where the requirement may be to selectively remove one or several components from the solid matrix. Other processes involving solids are concerned with the removal of discrete solid particles from either liquids or gases and vapours (but these will be discussed in other sections). 8 Solid-solid separations Separations can be achieved on the basis of particle size from the sorting of large food units down to the molecular level. Shape, and other factors such as electrostatic charge or degree of hydration, may also affect these separations. Screening of materials through perforated beds (e.g. wire mesh or silk screens) produces materials of more uniform particle size. Screening contributes to sorting and grading of many foods, in particular fruits, vegetables and cereals. Cleaning of particulate materials or powders in the dry state can be achieved using screens in two ways. Dedusting is the removal of undersize contaminants from larger particles, e.g. beans or cereals. Scalping is the removal of oversize contaminants from powders or small particulate materials, e.g. sugar, flour. A wide range of geometric designs exists, including flat bed and rotary fixed aperture screens, and numerous variable aperture designs are available (Slade, 1967; Brennan et al., 1990). Differences in aerodynamic properties can be exploited in the cleaning, sorting and grading of particulate food raw materials (e.g. cereals, peas, nuts, flour) in the dry state. Many designs of aspirator have evolved in which the feed is applied to controlled velocity air streams where separation into two or more fractions is effected. Alternatively, differences in hydrodynamic properties can be used in the sorting of foods such as apples or peas. A combination of particle size and density may be used to separate solids by settle- ment. If the solids are suspended in a fluid (liquid or gas), separation may be achieved on the basis that larger, more dense particles will settle more rapidly than smaller, less dense ones. This may be aided by the application of centrifugal force in air classification, as discussed in Chapter 9. Differences in buoyancy between solid particles is the basis of flotation washing of some foods. For example, heavy debris, such as stones or bruised and rotten fruit, may be removed from sound fruit by fluming the dirty produce over a series of weirs. Froth flotation depends on the differential wetting of particles. In the case of separat- ing peas from weed seeds, the mixture is immersed in a dilute mineral oil emulsion through which air is blown. The contaminating seeds float on the foam and may be skimmed off. On a smaller scale, the method can be used to separate materials which react selectively with a surfactant, such as heavy metals, from a mixture. Surface active agents, such as proteins and other foam-inducing materials, can be separated in a similar manner. These techniques are commonly used in effluent treatment. Operations where the outer surface of the food is removed also fall into this category. Examples include dehulling of cereals and legumes and peeling of fruit and vegetables (see Chapter 9). Cereals may be cleaned and sorted on the basis of shape to remove contaminants of similar size. Examples of this are disc and cylinder sorters which employ indentations of particular shape to pick up the corresponding food particles. A range of equipment is also available to separate food units on the basis of photo- metric, magnetic and electrostatic properties. Red and green tomatoes, or blackened beans or nuts may be separated automatically on the basis of reflectance properties. Magnetic cleaning is used to remove ferrous metal particles from foods, and thus to protect both the consumer and processing equipment. Electrostatic properties may be A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis Separation processes - an overview 9 exploited in separating seeds which may be of similar size and shape, or in the cleaning of tea. More detailed information on solid-solid separations is provided in Chapter 9. Separation from the solid matrix Many plant materials contain valuable liquid components such as oils or juices in the cellular structure. These may be separated from the pulped raw material by the use of presses, in a process known as expression. Batch type hydraulic systems or continuous roller, screw or belt systems are available for different applications such as fruit juice, wine and cane sugar production, or extraction of oil from seeds. Expression of fruit juices may be aided by the use of enzymes to improve efficiency of expression and to control the pectin level. Some of the physical properties related to expression processes are discussed by Schwartzberg (1983). An alternative system to recover components from within a solid matrix is extraction, which relies on the use of differential solubilities for extraction of soluble solids such as sugar from sugar beet, coffee from roasted ground beans, juices from fruit and vegetables and from materials during the manufacture of instant tea. The most common extraction material is hot or superheated water. However, organic solvents are used, e.g. hexane for oil extraction and methylene chloride to extract caffeine from tea and coffee. The use of supercritical fluids such as carbon dioxide is covered in detail in Chapter 2. Extraction processes as equilibrium stage processes are covered in more detail by Brennan et al. (1990), Loncin and Merson (1979), Perry and Green (1984). Many oil extraction processes employ expression, followed by solvent extraction, to obtain a high recovery of oil. The crude oil is then subjected to a series of refining processes, involving degumming, decolorisation and deodorisation to remove undesirable components. Water, the most common component of most foods, can be removed from solids by the process of dehydration; in this case thermal energy is required to effect evaporation of the water, and this is usually supplied by hot air. Hot air drying is classified as liquid phase drying and results in shrinkage and case-hardening and loss of some volatiles of foods. Types of drier include overdraught, throughdraught, fluidised bed and pneumatic driers. These are described in more detail by Brennan et al. (1990), Mujumdar (1987). Freeze-drying, whereby the food is frozen and then subjected to a vacuum, provides a method which reduces shrinkage, case-hardening and flavour loss. Sublimation occurs during freeze-drying. Here conditions are controlled such that water is removed directly from its solid phase to its vapour phase, without passing through the liquid state. To achieve this, the water vapour pressure must be kept below the triple point pressure (4.6 mm Hg) (Mellor, 1978; Dalgleish, 1990). The removal of air from fruit and vegetables, prior to heat treatment in sealed containers, is of paramount importance to prevent excessive strain on the seams during the sterilisation and subsequent cooling. This is accomplished by blanching, using steam or hot water. Nutrient losses due to leaching are minimised using steam (Selman, 1987). 10 1.2.3 Separations from liquids This section will cover those situations where the separation takes place from a fluid, i.e. a substance which flows when it is subject to a shear stress. An important physical property is the viscosity of the fluid, which is defined as the ratio of the shear stress to shear rate. Viscosity and its measurement is discussed in more detail by Lewis (1990). Solid components may be present dissolved in the liquid, in a colloidal dispersion or in suspension. For example, milk contains lactose, minerals and whey proteins in true solution, casein and calcium phosphate as a colloidal dispersion and fat globules dispersed in the aqueous phase. There may also be sediment resulting from other contaminants of the milk. The objective of the separation may be to remove any of these components. Liquid-solid separations Liquid-solid separation applies to operations where discrete solids are removed from the liquid. There are a number of ways of achieving this and these will be briefly reviewed. Conventional filtration systems separate suspended particles of solids from liquids on the basis of particle size. The liquid component is passed through a porous membrane or septum which retains the solid material either as a filter cake on the upstream surface, or within its structure, or both. Filter media may be rigid, such as wire mesh or porous ceramics, or flexible, such as woven textiles, and are available in a variety of geometric shapes and pore sizes. In practice, the flow of filtrate may be brought about by gravity, the application of pressure greater than atmospheric upstream of the filter (pressure filtration), applying a vacuum downstream (vacuum filtration) or by means of centrifugal force (centrifugal filtration). The theory and equipment for industrial filtration are fully described by Brennan et al. (1990). Applications can be divided into those where a slurry containing large amounts of insoluble solids is separated into a solid cake and a liquid, either of which may be the desired product; alternatively clarification is the removal of small quantities (<2%) of suspended solids from a valuable liquid. Filtration finds applications throughout the food and biotechnology industries. Sugar juices from cane or beet are filtered to remove high levels of insoluble solids, and are frequently clarified at a later stage. Filtration is employed at various stages during the refining of edible oils. In the brewing industry filtration of mash, yeast recovery after fermentation and clarification of beer are carried out. Filtration is used during the manufacture of numerous other foods, e.g. vinegar, starch and sugar syrups, fruit juices, wine, canning brines. In biotechnology, filtration is carried out to clarify and recover cells from fermentation broths. More recently, membranes with much smaller pores have been introduced. Micro- filtration involves the removal of very fine particles or the separation of microorganisms and sterilisation of fluids (see Chapter 5). Ultrafiltration membranes permit the passage of water and components of low molecular weight in a fluid but reject macromolecules such as protein or starch. Solids may be separated from liquids on the basis of particle size and density using settlement, or using centrifugation. Settlement is a slow process because it relies on the influence of gravity, but is widely used in water and effluent treatment processes. In A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis Separation processes - an overview 11 centrifugal classification a suspension of insoluble solids (not more than about 1%) is subjected to cyclic motion in a bowl, which subjects the particles to a centrifugal force, many times in excess of the gravitational force. The more dense solid is retained on the inner surface of the bowl while the liquid is tapped off at the centre. An alternative is to use a filtering centrifuge in which the bowl wall is perforated so the liquid is forced out through the wall. The size of the perforations determines what portion of solids is re- tained in the bowl. Various designs of centrifuge are available for numerous applications such as removal of solids from dairy fluids, oils, juices, beverages, fermentation broths, or dewatering of sugar crystals and corn starches. Such separations may be carried out on a batchwise basis, although automatic and continuous centrifuges are available. Solid-liquid separation techniques have been covered in more detail by Purchas and Wakeman (1986) and Brennan et al. (1990). Immiscible liquids Centrifugation in cylindrical bowls provides the simplest method to separate immiscible liquids of different densities. As the dense and lighter liquid streams are removed through- out, the operation can be carried out on a continuous basis. Either tubular-bowl or disc- bowl type centrifuges are normally used for liquid-liquid separation. The major applications are separating cream from milk, and dewatering oils at various stages during refining. General liquid separation processes Extraction of components from liquids can be achieved by contacting the liquid with a solvent which will preferentially absorb the components of interest and can then be separated from the liquid, for example by centrifugation. Such solvent extractions could be used for recovering oils and oil-soluble components of flavour components from liquids. However, such examples are not common in food processing. More information on the development of aqueous two-phase separations is given in Chapter 7. Other methods of separation involve inducing a phase change within the liquid. Crystallisation methods can be used to separate a liquid material into a solid and a liquid phase of different composition. One or both fractions may be the required product. It is important for subsequent separation of the two phases, that a controlled procedure is adopted to yield uniform crystals of a specified size and shape. Crystallisation can be effected by either cooling or evaporation to form a supersaturated solution in which crystal nuclei formation may or may not occur spontaneously. In many instances it is necessary to seed the solution by addition of solute crystals. Batch and continuous operations are possible, although control of crystal size is much more difficult in continu- ous systems. Fat fractionation, resulting from cry stallisation of triglycerides of higher molecular weight from a mixture, can be achieved by cooling as described in Chapter 8. Freeze concentration involves the crystallisation of ice from liquid foods such as fruit juices or alcoholic beverages. This has the advantage that concentration can be achieved without the application of heat, although the process is limited by cost, degree of concentration possible and loss of suspended components in the crystalline phase. The freezing process can be achieved in scraped surface heat exchangers. Evaporative crystallisation is used in 12 the manufacture of salt and sugar. Salt is crystallised from brine in multistage vacuum evaporators, and the crystals are allowed to grow in the circulating brine until they are large enough to settle out of the solution. In sugar crystallisation, the operating temperatures are limited by heat damage to the sucrose, therefore short tube evaporators are normally used. Seeding of sugar syrups is necessary, and the resulting crystals are recovered by centrifugation. Crystallisation can be employed in downstream processing in cases where the product is suitably robust. Citric acid, amino acids and some anti- biotics can be crystallised following multistage thermal evaporation. The other main phase change that can be induced is vaporisation. Removal of the main component, water, from solutions results in volume reduction, which is desirable for minimising storage, packaging and transport costs, and for treatment of effluents. It is often necessary to concentrate prior to operations such as drying and crystallisation. Water removal per se can be used as a preservation method when water activity is reduced. Evaporation is the concentration of a solution by boiling off the solvent, which is usually water. Many designs of evaporator are available, and the choice is largely de- pendent on the heat sensitivity of the food. Boiling temperature can be lowered by reducing the operating pressure, with most commercial evaporators working in the range 40-90°C. For heat-sensitive materials it is necessary to minimise both temperature and residence time in the heating zone. Energy can be saved by resorting to multiple-effect evaporation and incorporating vapour recompression systems. Evaporation results in a final product which is in the liquid form. An important part of the evaporation process is the removal of vapour from liquid. Vapour-liquid separations are relatively few in comparison, relying on the large density differences between the vapour and the liquid phase. The high-velocity mixture of liquid and vapour produced in the heat-exchange section (calandria) enters a separate vessel tangentially, the vapour leaves from the top and the liquid from the bottom. Care is taken to ensure that entrainment of liquid in the vapour stream is kept to a minimum. Foam is sometimes a problem in these applications. Most fluid foods contain volatile flavour and aroma products which are lost during thermal evaporation, which gives rise to a product with inferior flavour. This is particu- larly applicable to fruit juices. Volatile loss increases with the number of effects in the evaporator, and is likely to be higher for batch processes, where the liquid may pass several times through the heating section. One common solution is to remove the volatile components from the liquid, along with the water vapour and to recover them using a second condenser, operating at a much lower temperature. These volatiles can then be added back to the concentrate. One special type of evaporation is flash cooling, used to remove unwanted volatile components. This is achieved by heating the liquid, followed by subjecting it to a sudden reduction in pressure, sufficient to cause the fluid to boil. This evaporation process removes some water vapour and volatile components. One example is in removing off- flavours from cream. This process is known as vacreation and has been used to deodorise cream. Another example where flash cooling is built into the process is in direct heating ultra-high-temperature (UHT) processes. The product, such as milk, is preheated to about 75OC in an indirect plate or tubular heat exchanger. It is then contacted with clean steam A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis Separation processes - an overview 13 in an injection or infusion process. This results in rapid heating of the product up to about 14OOC and also about 10-15% dilution. The product is held for 2-4 s to achieve sterilisa- tion, and is then subjected to a flash cooling process, wherein the pressure is suddenly released and the temperature falls almost immediately to about 77-78OC. This causes some of the water to evaporate and this water vapour is separated from the milk. In this way, the solids content of the product is restored to its original value. Flash cooling will also remove both desirable and undesirable flavour components and dissolved oxygen. This is an example of a single-stage equilibrium process. A recent development involves using steam in a counter-current process to strip off the volatile components in liquids. The contact is achieved in a column in which a series of inverted cones rotate, between a series of stationary cones attached to the wall of the column. The steam is fed into the bottom of the column and the liquid at the top. The arrangement produces thin turbulent films and a large area for mass transfer to take place and incorporates many equilibrium stages in one unit. It has applications for volatile recovery from fruit juices and beverages, production of low-alcohol drinks and removing off-flavours and taints (see Fig. 1.1). An alternative to evaporation for water removal is reverse osmosis. The method em- ploys membranes that permit the passage of water molecules but are impermeable to solute ions and molecules. Therefore, if a solution is applied to the membranes at a pressure greater than the solution osmotic pressure, water passes through the membrane and solute is concentrated in the feed. This has the advantage that pressure, rather than heat, is the driving force, therefore heat damage is avoided. The theory and equipment for reverse osmosis are described in greater detail in Chapter 3. Reverse osmosis is used extensively for the production of pure water as the permeate, but can also be used for concentrating fluid foods such as milk or fruit juices. Dehydration is the name given to the process where the resulting product is in the solid form, usually with a moisture content below 10%. Dehydration processes involve the removal of water from solids or liquids. With liquids, preconcentration is an important requisite to reduce capital and energy costs. A whole range of techniques are available such as roller drying, band drying, spray drying and freeze drying, described fully elsewhere (e.g. Brennan et ai., 1990). Fluids dried include milk, eggs, coffee, tea, artificial creamers and purees made from fruit and vegetables. Reducing flavour loss and preventing heat-induced colour and flavour changes are important quality aspects. Dissolved gases can be removed from liquids used in sealed containers by either hot- filling, as near the boiling point as possible or by thermal exhausting boxes, whereby the filled cans are heated by steam or hot water prior to sealing. Hot-filling also reduces the air in the headspace. A process known as steam-flow closing can also be used. The final method for removing components from liquids involves the use of solid phase, in the form of a resin or beads, i.e. ion exchange. This is covered in more detail in Chapter 6. Separations from gases and vapours Filtration may also be used to recover solids suspended in gas. A filter cloth or screen of suitable mesh size is used to retain the solid. Bag filters can be used to recover powders 14 A. S. Grandison and M. J. Lewis I I Fig. 1.1. Anatomy of the spinning cone column (by courtesy of Flavourtech). from air following spray drying, and are frequently used in conjunction with cyclone separators. Cyclone separators can be used to separate powders from gases on the basis of particle size and density. The solid-gas suspension is introduced tangentially into a cylindrical vessel. The heavier solid particles are thrown to the wall, where on collision they lose kinetic energy and can be collected at the bottom of the vessel, the gas being removed at a separate take-off. Cyclones are employed in powder-handling systems and spray driers. Wet scrubbing separates suspended solids from gases on the basis of solubility of the solid in a solvent in which the gas is relatively insoluble. Wet scrubbing is used to recover the finest particles from milk drying, by extracting in evaporated milk or water. The charge on solid particles of suspended solids can be exploited to separate fine solids from gases, by passing the suspension between charged electrodes. The method can be used for recovery of powders, or dust removal from gases. When potable steam is required for direct steam heating processes, it is important to remove droplets of water, rust and oil. Filtration and centrifugal methods are useful for this purpose. Separation processes - an overview 15 1.3 WATER TREATMENT Water is another material which may be required in various levels of purity, depending upon its application. Water purification and the recovery of water from brackish water or sea water (desalination) involves a wide range of separation techniques, but the main process used is fractional distillation. Combinations of conventional filtration and reverse osmosis can also be used to produce potable water from brackish water (see Chapter 4). For more specialised chemical analyses distilled water, double-distilled or deionised water may be required. In the electronics industry there is a high demand for ultrapure water, for the production of microelectronics. The requirements for purity levels increase with the degree of sophistication. The sequence of operations for the production of ultrapure water is illustrated in Fig. 1.2 (Nishimura and Koyama, 1992). Water is subject to RO treatment (twice), conventional filtration, resin treatment to remove anions and cations, degasification, vacuum deaeration, microfiltration and a number of polishing stages. Fig. 1.2. Ultrapure water production system. F, filter; K, cation vessel; D, degasifier; CF, carbon filter; A, anion vessel; MF, micronic filter; RO, intermediate RO; STI, primary DI water storage tank; VD, vacuum deaerator; MBP, mixed bed polisher; ST2, secondary DI water storage tank; UV, UV steriliser; CP, cartridge polisher; FRO, final RO polisher (from Nishimura and Koyama, 1992, by courtesy of Marcel Dekker). REFERENCES Brennan, J. G., Butters, J. R., Cowell, N. D. and Lilley, A. E. V. (1990) Food Engineer- Dalgleish, J. McN. (1990) Freeze-drying for the Food Industry, Elsevier Applied Gekas, V. (1992) Transport Phenomena of Foods and Biological Materials. CRC Press, Jones, J. M. (1992) Food Safety, Egan Press, St Paul, Minnesota. King, C. J. (1982) Separation Processes, 2nd edn. McGraw-Hill, New Delhi. Levenspiel, 0. (1972) Chemical Reaction Engineering, Wiley, New York. Lewis, M. J. (1990) Physical Properties of Foods and Food Processing Systems. Ellis Loncin, M. and Merson, R. L. 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