MIXING TIME IN UNBAFFLED STIRRED TANKS

Unbaffled stirred tanks, despite their poorer mixing performance with respect to baffled vessels, are gaining a growing industrial interest as they provide significant advantages in selected applications, including a number of biochemical, food and pharmaceutical processes. There still is however a general lack of information on their mixing performance, that needs to be addressed in order to fully exploit their application potential. The present work is aimed at providing experimental information on mixing rates in an unbaffled vessel operated without top-cover (Uncovered Unbaffled Stirred Tank, UUST). The planar laser induced fluorescence (PLIF) technique was adopted for measuring the dis…