Sol-Gel reactor with rapid micromixing: Modelling and measurements of titanium oxide nano-particle growth

• Published in: Chemical engineering research & design Vol. 83; no. 1; pp. 67 - 74
• Main Authors: RIVALLIN, M, BENMAMI, M, KANAEV, A, GAUNAND, A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Rugby Institution of Chemical Engineers 2005; Elsevier
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Chemical engineering; Engineering Sciences; Exact sciences and technology; Other; Reactors; Particle size; Induction; Nanoparticle; Scale effect; In situ; Mixer; Modeling; Fiber optic sensors; Aggregation; Design; Extrapolation; Micromixing; Production; Kinetics; Particle size measurement; Measurement method; Reactor; Titanium oxide
• ISSN: 0263-8762; 1744-3563
• DOI: 10.1205/cherd.03073

We present a concept of the sol-gel reactor with injection of stock solutions through a T mixer, environmental gas control, thermal control of the reactive medium and in-situ particle size measurement using a monomode optical fibre probe. The rapid injection of the whole amount of reagents leads to short time of nucleation, and the micro-mixer eliminates gradients of concentrations, which results in higher local nucleation and aggregation rates. The reactor is used for production of mono-disperse nanometric titanium oxide sols. With this reactor, induction kinetics are reproducible and agree with a model describing the mean particle size increase by a slow aggregation process. As well as the in-situ size measurement technique, the reactor is a kinetic tool for determination of the sol aggregation rate. As the rules for scale-up of its equipment are already established, it is of interest for the operation and the design of industrial-scale sol-gel reactors.