Uptake of iron by Kluyveromyces marxianus DSM 5422 cultivated in a whey-based medium.

The ability of Kluyveromyces marxianus for converting lactose into ethyl acetate offers a chance for the economical reuse of whey. Iron plays a significant role in this process as ester synthesis requires a low intracellular iron content, xFe . The iron content in turn is decreased by growth due to cell expansion and increased by iron uptake. Thus, the iron-uptake rate, ψ, is important for the considered process. Iron uptake by K. marxianus DSM 5422 was studied in aerobic cultivation on a whey-borne medium with varied initial iron content, in part combined with a feed of iron under intensive growth conditions. A possible precipitation of iron that would pretend iron uptake was verified not to have occurred. Regularly measured dissolved iron concentrations, CFe,L , allowed the xFe and ψ parameters to be obtained by model-based iron balancing. The achieved data were used for establishing a ψ(CFe,L , xFe ) model. Mathematical simulations based on this iron-uptake model reproduced the performed cultivation processes. The created iron-uptake model allows for a future predictive system to be developed for the optimization of biotechnological ester production.

Optimisation of water-cannon cleaning for deposit removal on water walls inside waste incinerators.

Deposits in municipal waste incinerators are very inhomogeneous in structure and constitution. They cause corrosion and reduce the efficiency, so they need to be removed frequently. Among other systems, operators use water cannons for the deposit removal. Two different removal mechanisms of water-cannon cleaning are suggested: A direct shattering of the deposit by the impact of the water jet, as well as the cracking caused by thermal stresses where droplets cool the deposits. As the contribution of each of the aforementioned mechanisms to the overall cleaning efficiency is unknown, we performed empirical investigations to determine the dominating effect. In a first experimental setup focusing on thermal stress, cold droplets were applied onto hot deposits taken from a waste incinerator. Results showed that the cleaning effect strongly depends on the deposit thickness and structure, so that the deposits could be categorised in three different groups. A second measurement campaign focused on the influence of deposit material, deposit temperature and water jet momentum. It could be shown that both deposit material and temperature have a significant effect on the cleaning efficiency, whereas an increase in water jet momentum only led to modest improvements. The combination of these two parameter studies implies that the influence of the thermal stress outweighs that of the momentum. This knowledge is applicable to the cleaning setup by increasing the temperature gradient.