INTRODUCTION

RIASSUNTO

CHAPTER 1

PGSS FUNDAMENTALS AND STATE OF ART

1.1 SUPERCRITICAL FLUIDS (SF)
1.1.1 Properties of SF
1.1.2 Applications

1.2 PARTICLE FORMATION TECHNOLOGIES
1.2.1 Conventional methods
1.2.2 Summary of SF based techniques

1.3 RAPID EXPANSION OF SUPERCRITICAL SOLUTIONS (RESS)

1.4 GAS/SUPERCRITICAL ANTISOLVENT PROCESS (GAS/SAS)

1.5 PARTICLES FROM GAS-SATURATED SOLUTIONS (PGSS)
1.5.1 Process description
1.5.2 State of the Art
1.5.3 Equilibrium Behaviour of highly Asymmetrical Systems

1.6 SOLID LIPID NANOPARTICLES (SLN)
1.6.1 Introduction
1.6.2 State of the Art

1.7 ENCAPSULATION IN SLN
1.7.1 Overview
1.7.2 Acoustically Active Liposomes (AAL)
1.7.3 SLN Encapsulating a liquid phase

1.8 BIBLIOGRAPHY

CHAPTER 2

PGSS PLANT

2.1 BATCH UNIT
2.1.1 Overview
2.1.2 Materials
2.1.3 Operational Procedure

2.2 DEVELOPMENT OF A NEW CONTINUOUS PGSS PLANT

2.3 EQUIPMENT DESIGN AND PERFORMANCE
2.3.1 Final Flowsheet
2.3.2 Mass balance of lipids and CO2
2.3.3 Melting tank
2.3.4 Mixer
2.3.5 Particle Separation
2.3.5.1 Cyclone
2.3.5.2 Filter
2.3.5.3 Electrofilter
2.3.6 Heat Exchange

2.4 BIBLIOGRAPHY

CHAPTER 3

CFD SIMULATION AND ATOMIZER DESIGN

3.1 BIPHASIC REGIME DEFINITION
3.1.1 The VOF Model
3.1.2 Regime Prediction
3.1.3 Simulation
3.1.3.1 Horizontal Flow
3.1.3.2 Upflow
3.1.3.3 Downflow

3.2 ATOMIZER DESIGN
3.2.1 Spray nozzles types
3.2.2 Liquid Jet Model
3.2.3 Modeling Turbulence
3.2.4 Simulation Results
3.2.4.1 Effervescent Atomizer
3.2.4.2 Air blast Atomizer

3.3 DIFFUSER DESIGN
3.3.1 Simulation Results
3.3.2 Final Atomizer-Diffuser Design

3.4 BIBLIOGRAPHY

CHAPTER 4

EXPERIMENTS

4.1 CALIBRATION OF CO2 PUMP

4.2 AIR FLOW MEASUREMENTS

4.3 PGSS RUNS
4.3.1 Klinger View Cell
4.3.2 Particle production

4.4 PARTICLE SIZE DETERMINATION
4.4.1 Dynamic Light Scattering
4.4.2 Samples Preparation
4.4.3 Light Scattering Results

4.5 SCANNING ELECTRON MICROSCOPY (SEM)
4.5.1 Overview
4.5.2 Resulting pictures
4.5.2.1 Tristearin-Pc (50:50 w/w)
4.5.2.2 Tristearin-Pc (50:50 w/w) with 15% and 30% (w) of PFC
4.5.2.3 Tristearin-Pc (50:50 w/w) with 45% and 56% (w) of PFC
4.5.2.4 Tristearin-Pc (50:50 w/w) with Castor Oil

4.6 GAS CHROMATOGRAPHY - MASS SPECTROMETRY (GC-MS)
4.6.1 Gas Chromatography (GC)
4.6.2 Mass Spectrometry (MS)
4.6.3 Instrument Used
4.6.4 Determination of Perfluorocarbon encapsulated in the lipidic matrix
4.6.5 Results

4.7 FINAL REMARKS AND SUGGESTIONS

4.8 BIBLIOGRAPHY

CONCLUSIONS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS