Research progress, key scientific problems and countermeasures of “green concentration” technology based on membrane and its integration process / 中草药

ABSTRACT

The energy consumption of Chinese materia medica industry is astonishing. The steam consumption of the heavy concentrating section accounts for about 60% of the whole plant, or even higher. Membrane concentration technology has the important advantages of “low energy consumption and low cost”, but it is restricted by the respective defects caused by the technical principles of different membrane processes. Our research group introduces the international advanced integrated design strategy and method in view of the key technology of “reverse osmosis and membrane distillation integration” which is expected to suitable for the concentrated demand of Chinese medicine pharmaceutical industry. Taking the representative Chinese herbal compound prescription as the experimental system, a three-dimensional model of "time-material rheological characteristics-membrane mass transfer process" was established by using rheological theory and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) as experimental system and dynamic and precise analysis of technological process. The rheological law of traditional Chinese medicine materials and its influence on membrane concentration process were explored by means of multi-disciplinary methods. The mass transfer effect and mechanism of membrane concentration process on traditional Chinese medicine materials were elaborated. The equilibrium points of critical osmotic pressure (RO process) and critical flux (membrane distillation process) were found. The optimal combination schemes of reverse osmosis (RO) and membrane distillation (MD) were explored. In short, we solved the key technical problems of the membrane concentration process, which provided support for the complete set of technical equipment and the technological design, and promoted the theoretical and technological innovation of TCM pharmaceutical engineering.