MICROFILTRATION OF YEAST-CELLS IN AN INTERNAL FILTER REACTOR

Microfiltration was carried out in a newly-developed internal filter r eactor system (stainless steel membrane filter, pore size=2 or 10 mu m ) using yeast cells of Saccharomyces cerevisiae ATCC 24858, industrial S. cerevisiae, and recombinant yeast RH 51. The filter performance wa s measured in terms of filtrate flux and retention coefficient of cell , and was highly influenced by agitation speed and cell concentration. Both gel polarization model and solid nux model failed to predict the filtration behavior in the internal filter system. An empirical equat ion was obtained to correlate filtrate flux as a function of agitation speed and cell concentration. Retention coefficient with a filter of 2 mu m pore size was found mote than 95%, and the filter was suitable fur the yeast cell separation.