Patent ID: 8940176
Filing Date: 2015-01-27
Classification: B01D,B01L

Abstract:
1. A method of extracting a liquid phase from a suspension, the method comprising: injecting said suspension into a duct presenting a first section that is straight and a second section that is curved so as to form a single bend; subjecting said suspension to lift forces in the straight section of said duct that cause particles in said suspension to be superconcentrated in a ring around the longitudinal axis of the duct; subjecting said suspension to Dean secondary flows in the bend of said duct that deforms said ring so as to give rise to two vortices with the duct, so that at end an of said bend, a majority of the particles are condensed together on an inside of said bend, to thereby cause a spatial separation between a liquid-enriched fraction and a particle-enriched fraction; and extracting the liquid-enriched fraction of said suspension that is spatially separated from the particle-enriched fraction of the suspension at an outlet from said curved section of the duct, wherein said liquid-enriched fraction being extracted from an outside part of said bend; wherein the step of subjecting said suspension to Dean secondary flows further comprises superconcentrating the particle on an inside of a bend of the curved section, wherein said liquid-enriched suspension fraction is extracted from the outside of the bend and wherein the Dean number of the flow of the suspension in the curved section of the duct lies in the range 1 to 140.