Flux decline during electric field-assisted cross-flow ultrafiltration of mosambi (Citrus sinensis (L.) Osbeck) juice

Electric field-assisted cross-flow ultrafiltration of mosambi (Citrus sinensis (L.) Osbeck) juice has been carried out using a 50 kDa molecular weight cut-off membrane. Electric field is applied in both constant as well as pulse mode. The effect of process parameters, e.g., electric field, pulse ratio, cross-flow velocity and transmembrane pressure on the permeate flux and energy consumption are studied. Application of dc electric field has resulted in significant improvement of permeate flux. Application of pulsed electric field is found to be more beneficial in terms of energy consumption, and equally effective in terms of flux augmentation as compared to constant field. An already developed resistance-in-series model based on gel layer theory is used incorporating the effect of constant as well as pulsed electric field and numerically solved to quantify the flux decline and gel layer deposition. The predictions from the numerical solution of the model are successfully compared with experimental results under various operating conditions.