Bio Functional Food Engineering Unit

First stage facilities for the isolation, fractionation and preservation of bioactive food ingredients.

The Biofunctional Food Engineering Facility (B FE) is a state-of-the-art facility for food technologists to separate, stabilise and deliver bioactive ingredients in food products with commercial potential.

Designed to fast track the transfer of ideas from the laboratory to pilot plant, the range of unit operations offered by BFE cover areas such as dehydration, separation, encapsulation and thermal processing. BFE investment is intended to improve R&D productivity in advance of pilot scale studies. Ultimately, the facility will make a key contribution to the development of foods and beverages containing bio-active ingredients with proven stability and shelf-life.

Equipment	Manufacturer / Model	Capacity	Comment
Tubular Heat exchanger + in line/off line 2 stage Homogeniser	MicroThermics Electric Development Series UHT/HTST	30-60 l/h	Range of holding tubes – 6s to 300s hold tubes,
	Lab-25HVH (E-Series HVH, HVH=High Viscosity Hybrid)		capable of pumping viscous fluids
Clean fill Unit with sterile product outlet	Microthermics Model Clean fill Unit with sterile product outlet	30-60 l/h
Small scale evaporator	Scheffers	water evaporation capacity 30 kg/h
Multi stage -Spray Dryer	Anhydro	water evaporation capacity 30 kg/h	Fluidising capability, agglomeration
Microfluidiser	Microfluidics Laboratory Microfluidizer® Processor M-110EH	450 ml/min	Operating pressure range to 25,000 psi (1720 bar).
In-Line mixer/powder dispenser	Y-Tron ZC 1	57-150 l/min liquid , 27 l/min Powder	Extremely difficult to wet out powders are processed in a single pass
Absorber Chromatography Unit	Unipektin	10 l/h	can be used for proteins, carbohydrate and lipid purification
Concentric Nozzle Encapsulator	Inotech Encapsulator	1-5L	In combination with the microfluidiser, the encapsulator can produce
			nanoemulsions suitable for incorporation into different food/beverage products