Fluidic separation in microstructured devices – Concepts and their Integration into process flow networks

FDA and pharmaceutical industry turn the vision of integrated end-to-end manufacturing currently into reality. Accordingly, besides the efforts to develop reactions in continuous flow, it is also essential to consider separation of reaction mixtures and purification of the desired product - and how these are best integrated into a process design. In this context, the coupling of flow reactors and flow separators as well as coupling of different flow separators, regarded as hybrid processes, are considered. This review shows current successful developments on fluidic separation units and their integration in process flow networks, in which reactors and separators are connected. The review also gives developments on countercurrent-flow separation units, which are necessary for highly-efficient, continuous processing. Such multiple equilibrium steps are necessary, but hard to achieve for small flow rates.