Seeding in the improvement of the production process of sugar from sugarcane

• Grant number: 23/13892-9
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: May 01, 2024
• End date: December 31, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Chemical Engineering - Chemical Process Industries
• Principal Investigator: Carlos Eduardo Crestani
• Grantee: Guilherme Maddalena de Oliveira
• Host Institution: Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia de São Paulo (IFSP). Campus Matão. Matão , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Solid products of high quality and with appropriate crystalline properties are essentially produced by the crystallization of solutes from their solution, mainly in the fine chemical, pharmaceutical, and food industries. Still, it is a process with challenges and problems in the process and the repeatability of the characteristics of the product; One of the main causes is uncontrollable nucleation. Seeding strategies for crystallization processes have been developed for various applications aiming at minimizing unwanted nucleation effects. A review of the literature shows advances in research involving seeding in various fields of crystallization, such as proteins and the pharmaceutical industry, and Brazil still has a lacuna of sugarcane to sugar beet, from other countries, not that it says respect to the Initial development of the seeds for the production of sugar with the best quality. The objective of this study is, from reliable experimental data on the solubility of sucrose in sugarcane molasses, the development of seed suspensions to extract them in size, shape, impurities, and distribution must be defined as the procedures and conditions for such. The combined results of these studies should make it possible to increase the efficiency and robustness of the cane sugar production process, which can be better controlled, eliminating idleness. Furthermore, its industrial application, considered the next step, will generate a lot of room for research combining seeding with the design and control of the crystallizer and the development of the process in the future.