d|b|t|a Newsletter 2022
Many thanks to Erik Esche for a language check of the final version.

d|b|t|a Newsletter 2022

Contents

  1. Preface
  2. Projects
  3. Team
  4. Publications
  5. Social Media
  6. d|b|t|a Networking
  7. Dissertations
  8. d|b|t|a International
  9. Events
  10. News from our Workshop


1 Preface

Dear Friends, Alumni, and Members of d|b|t|a,

It is hard to believe how fast another year has gone by. Certainly, we are all happy that in-person meetings are possible again more frequently and that project meetings, conferences, doctoral exams, and lectures could take place in real rooms with real people. Unfortunately, the terrible events in Ukraine have greatly dampened this joy. We all hope that this unbelievable war will soon come to an end. Besides the great suffering for the affected people, this war also touches our lives, and we are facing new challenges. Nevertheless, we would like to look back on the past year at d|b|t|a with this newsletter.

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Jens-Uwe Repke (copyright: TU Berlin/Pressestelle/Philipp Arnoldt).

We were again able to acquire several projects, are involved in a new EU project on hydrogen, have started a new industrial cooperation on methanol and are also involved in the second phase of the cluster of excellence UniSysCat. However, the year was primarily characterized by consolidating diverse research projects and the creation of new project ideas. Furthermore, the Collaborative Research Centre “InPROMPT” came to an end after more than 12 years. A book will remain heritage. We also supplied a chapter to a book on process intensification / HiGEE technologies, which was published this year. Lastly, the research cluster on foam ended this year and many results are summarized in a Special Issue of Chemical Engineering & Technology , which we edited.

There is much more to report this year, some of which you will find in this newsletter. I would like to highlight three events here: We were involved with numerous contributions at Distillation & Absorption, which took place in Toulouse this year. Also, I was very pleased that we could gather for an alumni reunion. I think all attendees will have fond memories of both day and evening. Finally, I would like to mention that you can now follow us on LinkedIn at Process Dynamics and Operations Group (dbta) | Technische Universit?t Berlin and I would be happy if our posts meet your interests there.I hope this year‘s newsletter also garners your attention.

I would like to thank all those who have contributed to the success of d|b|t|a! Special thanks to Janina Deichl and Markus Illner for editing this newsletter!

I wish you all the best and, above all, stay healthy!

Jens-Uwe Repke


2 Projects

FVM-CFD: Reduced Basis CFD for Catalytic Monoliths

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Visualization of the concept for the reduced-based approach.

In recent years, catalytic monoliths have gained attention due to their characteristics, such as improved heat and mass transfer, lower pressure drop, and reduced hotspot formations. Lately, their application is considered because of the advances of 3D printing, which allows the exploitation of various geometrical configurations of monoliths. To optimize these monolith geometries for maximum yield, better energy utilization, and optimal flow characteristics, we require detailed computational analysis techniques, e.g., CFD. However, the current CFD-based approaches require a high amount of computational effort to iteratively solve the nonlinear set of flow equations and their nonlinear coupling with reaction rate expressions. Besides, the challenge of disparate time and length scales is yet to be solved. Hence, we propose a surrogate reduced-basis CFD approach to significantly lower the computational expense associated with this nonlinear reaction-flow coupling and having a solution with reasonable accuracy.

We will study the carbon dioxide conversion to methanol, followed by dehydration to dimethyl ether. The used catalysts will be Cu/ZnO/Al2O3 and 3D-printed zeolite monoliths. The Julia programming language will be used to develop the reduced-basis CFD model. Since this project involves a deep understanding of chemistry and mathematics at the same time, we will be collaborating with the Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft and Weierstrass Institute of Applied Analysis and Stochastics for this project.

Contact: Muhammad Uzair Qureshi

HySTrAm: Hydrogen Storage and Transport using Ammonia

As part of the European Commission’s ‘Hydrogen strategy for a climateneutral Europe‘, the HySTrAm (Hydrogen Storage and Transport using Ammonia) research project implements a novel ammonia synthesis process. Unlike the existing Haber-Bosch process, HySTrAm’s proposed process takes green hydrogen as an input and its catalytic reactor shall enable favorable operating conditions with respect to temperature and pressure. Therefore, short-term hydrogen storage by physisorption on novel metal-organic structures shall be enabled to dampen the temporal fluctuation in the availability of green hydrogen. The goal is to design an intensified fixed-bed reactor for ammonia synthesis, which achieves a higher single-pass conversion compared to the established Haber-Bosch process thanks to integrated product adsorption. To this end, HySTrAm develops novel catalyst materials with a reduced ruthenium content, a sor-bent material for fixing NH3 along the reactor, and a support material for inductive reactor heating. With the help of these materials, a time-flexible process mode shall be facilitated.

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Visualization of the concept of the HySTrAm project.

Within the HySTrAm project, d|b|t|a will contribute parameter and state estimation, dynamic process modeling on different length and time scales, and data-driven dynamic surrogate models for the overall process.

Contact: Carl Sengoba

Auto-PhS for MES: Automated Phase Separation Testing for Microemulsions

Microemulsion systems are an outstanding solution to use the advantages of highly selective homogeneous catalysis whilst also ensuring excellent retention of valuable catalysts. This is achieved by making a catalyst soluble in water and then adding surfactants to enable good mass transfer between a water-rich catalyst phase and an oily substrate phase in which, e.g., a reaction with hydrogen or carbon monoxide gas takes place. The catalyst is recovered after the reaction in a phase separation step where three separate liquid phases appear. This phase separation is essential to the concept of reactions in microemulsion systems and needs to be supervised closely to ensure stable continuous operation in our mini-plant.

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Image of our measurement cell.

The major challenge is that there are up to 12 components in the reaction mixture and a concentration shift of each of these has an influence on the phase separation. Currently, microemulsion systems are too complex to be described with activity coefficient models or equations of state and hence an empirical approach is required to quantify influences of the reaction components on the phase separation. With our new experimental setup, we are able to perform phase separation experiments at 30 bar and up to 160 °C in a small testing cell with integated heating and cooling. To investigate a composition, experiments at different temperatures can be run fully automated. The setup will be combined with automatic AI-based image recognition to quickly gain a maximum of information.

Contact: Karsten Duch

SPIV-PLIF: Simultaneous experimental analysis of concentration and velocity fields in liquid film flows over microstructured surfaces

For several years, d|b|t|a has successfully been researching experimental and numerical methods to investigate fluid dynamics and mass transport of liquid film flows on structured surfaces. For this reason, we are pleased to be able to continue to contribute to the identification and basic understanding of the phenomenological microstructure influence. This new research project is funded by the German Research Foundation. The results enable a better understanding of the optimization of structured packings in thermal separation processes in the chemical industry.

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Image of our optical test stand.

The focus of the research project is the investigation of the absorption behavior of different unidirectional and bidirectional microstructures. For this purpose, the concentration and velocity fields are determined under industry-related boundary conditions. Two practical non-invasive optical measurement methods are used for the measurement. The concentration distribution is measured using planar laser-induced fluorescence. Stereo particle image velocimetry enables the fluid analysis of the film flow. The experimental research results are recorded and validated at the department with numerical simulations. The aim is therefore also to provide a robust database for the validation of numerical flow simulations for microstructure optimization.

Contact: Johann Weigelt

CoE (UniSysCat): Holistic simulation-based approach for optimal catalyst design in heterogeneous tandem catalysis

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Idea of the UniSysCat project.

A new joint project in the scope of the UniSysCat - Cluster of Excellence about multiscale modeling and experimental validation for the optimization of close proximity tandem catalysis systems has recently been accepted for the period from January 2023 to December 2025.The d|b|t|a will mainly be contributing to this project with its expertise on modelling reactive catalytic systems, their experience on numerical optimization and their state-of-the-art testing facility. Together, this joint project will develop a combined theoretical-experimental multiscale approach which paves the way for a rational design of bifunctional catalysts for tandem catalysis systems. A scale bridging picture ranging from the atomistic scale to continuum scale will be drawn in close collaboration with our project partners Prof. Franziska He? (TU Berlin), Dr. Sebastian Matera and Dr. Johannes Margraf (both FHI). Prof. Arne Thomas (TU Berlin) and Prof. Aleksander Gurlo (TU Berlin) will explore new ways in the design, synthesis and functionalization of catalytic materials. Thermodynamic evaluations of the system of interest will be done by Prof. Reinhard Schom?cker (TU Berlin).

Contact: Georg Tobias Br?sigke


3 Team

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Yvonne Brozio

Yvonne Brozio is a trained industrial business management assistant and worked for many years and several companies as administration support. In 2017, she joined TU Berlin, mainly as administrative support. She switched to d|b|t|a in 2022, and is now working on planning, organization, and finance.


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Paul Warsawa

Paul Warsawa started his training as mechatronics technician in 2018 and successfully completed it in January 2022. During his apprenticeship, he learned the basics of mechanics and electrical engineering, which he refined at d|b|t|a and with which he was able to realize our film flow project during his apprenticeship. Since January, Paul supports the workshop team as a skilled worker.


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Matthias Müller

Matthias Müller is a trained IT specialist and studied Geology at Freie Universit?t Berlin. He will support d|b|t|a’s team with daily IT tasks and keep the infrastructure up to date. Matthias will also contribute to the further development of MOSAICmodeling. His scientific interests lie in the areas of algorithm optimization, high performance computing, and cellular automata.


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Johann Weigelt

Johann Weigelt studied Physics Engineering at TU Berlin. He joined d|b|t|a in September 2022 after working as development engineer for almost 2 years. His DFG research topic focuses on the experimental analysis of the mass transport in liquid film flows when flowing over microstructured surfaces. For his studies, he uses optical measuring methods, such as pLIF and sPIV.


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Muhammad Uzair Qureshi

Muhammad Uzair Qureshi completed his M.Sc. in Chemical Engineering at the National University of Sciences and Technology, Pakistan. His research focused on CFD modeling for determining the mass transfer rate increase due to chemical reaction in Venturi scrubbers. He is currently pursuing his PhD on “Reduced CFD-based optimization of 3D-printed catalytic monolith geometries for heterogeneous tandem catalysis”.


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Joshua Orthey

Joshua Orthey studied Chemical Engineering at KIT in Karlsruhe, focusing on chemical reactions as well as heat and mass transfer. His master‘s thesis adressed precipitation crystallization and dimensional analysis. He joined d|b|t|a as a research assistant and works on the CemRoCap project, where he is concerned with the absorption of CO2?from industrial exhaust gases using RPBs.

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Philipp Wagner

Philipp Wagner studied Process Engineering at TU Bergakademie Freiberg. In his Master’s thesis, he investigated the mass transport in supercritical fluids to produce bio-aerogels, which are very light materials made of biomass and highly porous. He joined d|b|t|a in December 2022 and will work on the treatment of sulfurous water from the wet oxidative gas desulphurization process.



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Carl Sengoba

Carl Sengoba completed his M.Sc. in Chemical Engineering at RWTH Aachen. His master‘s thesis focused on optimal scheduling for the operation of an air separation plant. He joined d|b|t|a in September 2022. His research interest are dynamic modeling under uncertainty and surrogate-based optimal control. Currently, he is working on the European project HySTrAm.


4 Publications

d|b|t|a is proud to announce contributions to two books, which have already been published in 2022.

After 12 years, the Collaborative Research Centre TR 63 “Integrated Che-mical Processes in Liquid Multiphase Systems” (InPROMPT) has ended. Its major advancements and findings have been collected within the open-access book “Integrated Chemical Processes in Liquid Multiphase Systems - From Chemical Reaction to Process Design and Operation ”. d|b|t|a contributed fundamentals and integrated process development for microemulsion systems, as well as collaborative process modeling and optimization under uncertainty of real-life mini-plant operations using microemulsions.

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Covers of both books.

Furthermore d|b|t|a’s activities on process intensification by HiGee machines for separation processes have entered the 2nd edition of the book “Process Intensification: by Rotating Packed Beds ”, edited by Andrzej Górak and Mirko Skiborowski . d|b|t|a contributed a chapter on “Rotating packed beds in distillation: rate-based modeling for multicomponent systems”.


5 Social Media

d|b|t|a on LinkedIn

Since the middle of October, 2022, d|b|t|a is active on LinkedIn. Here, we share news and additional information on our research group, videos about our facilities, information for students, upcoming events, job postings, and much more. We look forward to seeing you there! If you are interested, follow us at Process Dynamics and Operations Group (dbta) | Technische Universit?t Berlin .

Relaunch of d|b|t|a website

For moving TU Berlin‘s websites to TYPO3, we put together a team of six people in March 2021 who managed the web relaunch at d|b|t|a. Our first step was to take a fresh look at the old website and to prune all unneces-sary content. Afterwards, a basic layout structure was developed in Power Point for the different areas of the website, such as research, teaching, etc. After approval by the research group, the ideas were implemented in TYPO3. In March 2022, we went online with our new website, which did not go unnoticed by the web relaunch team of the university. More information can be found in the interview with Erik Esche .


6 d|b|t|a Networking

MR4B – Mixed Reality4Business

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You can find out more about the project by clicking on the logo.

The WIR!-Bündnis MR4B targets the structural transformation of Berlin and Brandenburg through artificial intelligence (AI) and mixed reality applications (MR). A primary goal is to sustainably change work environments and jobs through introduction of MR technology into day-to-day business in industry. d|b|t|a has been a partner of the large consortium since day one and is actively pursuing projects within the consortium. Two out of four projects have already passed the supervisory board of MR4B and we are awaiting the grants any day now.

Within “MR Data Hub”, we partner with SMEs to tackle the interconnectivity issues that make developing MR solutions for industry expensive. This will be a cross-sectional project within MR4B furthering standardization and reuse of adapter technologies in all MR4B projects.

Within “Handbook2AR”, we will employ AI techniques to make handbooks, manuals, and other plant documentation available in augmented reality settings automatically. In the long run we hope to facilitate all types of regular maintenance tasks by supplying the necessary information on the fly on-site.

SPP 2331 Meeting

Our department has the honor to be part of two research projects within the DFG priority program Machine Learning in Chemical Engineering (SPP 2331), which was also co-initiated by us. More than 50 researchers from the fields of machine learning and chemical engineering are working together since January 2022 to solve chemical engineering problems using different machine learning methods.

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SPP group at RWTH Aachen.

In collaboration with the Fraunhofer ITWM ( Michael Bortz ), we are looking for ways to use kernel methods to describe confidence regions of model parameters. Accurate confidence intervals are used to estimate parameters for an esterification reaction model and to design the optimal experiments in a laboratory experiment.

In the second project, conducted in collaboration with the laboratory of process automation systems at TU Dortmund University ( Sergio Lucia ), we use reinforcement learning to optimize the full operation cycle of a batch distillation tower, from start-up to shut-down. The model prediction is then tested in a real column in our group. We thank our partners for the close and fruitful cooperation and look forward to the exciting next two years!

Doctoral Student Seminar on Fluid Dynamics

After a brief pause due to the pandemic, the Fluid Process Engineering Division finally held the next doctoral student seminar on September 29 & 30, 2022, at the TU Hamburg at the Institute for Process Systems Engineering. For all those who arrived a day early, a convivial evening kicked off the seminar in a bar in the centre of Harburg. The first official day included two presentations from industry, which initiated the further discussions in the form of a World Café in smaller groups to answer the following questions

  • What should students of chemical engineering definitely learn for the future and how?
  • What is the future in modeling fluid separation: machine learning, mechanistic models, or hybrid approaches?
  • What could distillation 3.0 look like?

Thereafter, the deliberations of each group were presented and discussed with all participants. The seminar concluded with a workshop on scientific publishing.

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PhD students discussing hot topics in fluid dynamics.

Workshops on Rotating Packes Beds in France and Poland

d|b|t|a is well connected within the European family of departments working on HiGee units. In recent years, a network of open exchange has grown through contributions and discussions at conferences. Recently, the HiGee group of d|b|t|a was invited to visit the Chemical Engineering Laboratory at INP Toulouse, France, led by Michel Meyer , and to visit colleagues in ?ód?, Poland. There, they toured the production facility of the RPB manufacturer ProSpin and participateed in the experiments at TU ?ód?: At the latter, the experimental group was led by a group of visiting researchers from the Technical University of Brno, Czech Republic, who excel in optical studies of atomisers. For three days, different types of packing and different operating conditions were tested. Due to the extreme operating conditions in RPBs and the complexity of the design, the practical experience of all three groups was needed to achieve good and reliable results. In the end, all groups gained deeper insights into RPB hydrodynamics, operation, and design through fruitful discussions during and after the tests. The HiGee group of d|b|t|a is looking forward to the next opportunity to exchange with their peers from all over Europe.


7 Dissertations

  • On March 25, Dr.-Ing. Johannes Sacher successfully defended his PhD thesis on the topic of ?Development of a Mesoscale Model for the Gas Phase Fluid Dynamics in Structured Packings on the Basis of Fundamental Experiments and DNS Simulations“. We congratulate Johannes for his achievements and wish him all the best for the future.
  • On May 17, Dr.-Ing. Matthias Hilpert successfully defended his PhD thesis with the topic ?Development of a Rate-Based Model for Multi-Component Distillation in a Rotating Packed Bed based on Mass Transfer Experiments“. d|b|t|a congratulates him sincerely and wishes him all the best for his future.
  • On June 29, Dr.-Ing. Andreas Obermeier successfully defended his PhD thesis on ?Derivation of design decisions for dynamically operated air separation units using methods of Operations Research“. d|b|t|a congratulates him sincerely and wishes him all the best for his future.
  • d|b|t|a also congratulates Dr.-Ing. Sebastian Riethof for his successful defense on November 11, 2022. As part of his PhD project, he dealt with the ?Development and integration of a new process to extend the value chain of a coking plant“. d|b|t|a congratulates him and wishes him all the best for his future.


8 d|b|t|a International

Scientific Guests

In April and May, 2022, we hosted Prof. Dr. Karen Pontes of Universidade Federal da Bahia. She received a DAAD scholarship to investigate applications of rotating packed-beds for absorption of CO2 in off-shore settings. During her stay, we had fruitful discussions on model formulations, future work in MOSAICmodeling, and further steps to strengthen our collaboration.

We were happy to welcome to Prof. Lorenz T. Biegler of Carnegie Mellon University when he arrived at d|b|t|a in June. He stayed for a scientific exchange until July, 2022. Thanks to the nomination by Prof. Repke, Prof. Biegler received the Alexander von Humboldt Research Award. Parts of the award are earmarked for his stays at d|b|t|a. Prof. Biegler is an internationally renowned expert in the field of nonlinear optimization and a long-time friend of our group. He is best known for the interior point solver IPOPT and his work in the area of dynamic optimization.

ProcessNet FVT

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d|b|t|a delegation in front of the Dechema Haus. From left to right: Jens-Uwe Repke, Hannes Raddant, René P?schmann, Markus Illner, Julian Wurm, Alexander Ressemann.

After several postponements, the ProcessNet FVT conference took place in Frankfurt am Main on May 2-3, 2022, with d|b|t|a contributing three presentations and two posters. Alexander Ressemann discussed the development of a new temperature measurement methodology for RPBs to track separation efficiency. Julian Wurm showed the experimental investigation of wet oxidative desulfurization in a mini-plant with a focus on operation strategies to avoid solid precipitation, while Hannes Raddant presented a poster on the characterization of fluid dynamics of hanging film flows using light-induced fluorescence. Markus Illner gave a talk on foam destruction in columns with structured packings using acoustic sound. Finally, René P?schmann gave a collaborative talk with Amelie Merkel from Ruhr University Bochum on the development of geometrically variable miniature measuring cells for the determination of HETP values of structured packings.

32nd European Symposium on Computer-aided Process Engineering (ESCAPE-32)

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From left to right: Bastian Bruns (Ruhr University Bochum), Gerardo Brand Rihm, Christian Hoffmann.

From June 12 to 15, 2022, we presented current research at ESCAPE-32 in Toulouse, France. Christian Hoffmann presented results on the "Optimal aeration of wastewater treatment plants based on recurrent neural networks and real plant data", while Gerardo Brand Rihm gave a talk on "Data-driven modeling of full batch distillation cycles based on recurrent neural networks". In the first contribution, we employed real dynamic plant data to train a model and used it for optimal control of a wastewater treatment plant. In the second contribution, we trained a model for a batch distillation using Aspen Dynamics simulations via a recipe by varying the respective recipe parameters. Both contributions were published in the conference proceedings in Computer Aided Chemical Engineering Vol. 51 .

14th International Symposium on Process Systems Engineering (PSE 2021+)

From June 19 to 23, 2022, we participated in the 14th International Symposium on Process Systems Engineering (PSE 2021+). Christian Hoffmann presented on "Integration of design and operation for the CO2-based methanol synthesis", Erik Esche gave a talk on “Real-time optimal operation of a chlor-alkali electrolysis process under demand response”, and Markus Illner discussed his poster with the title “D-RTO as enabler for green chemical processes - systematic application and challenges in reactive liquid multiphase systems”. All contributions were published in the conference proceedings in Computer Aided Chemical Engineering Vol. 49. This year, we only participated online, but we look forward to the next PSE in person!

ROTOR Colloquium

35 experts from 11 countries took part in the second interdisciplinary colloquium on rotating packed-beds (RPB), which took place this year at the ROTOR Group of TU Dortmund University. The conference participants, i.e., scientists, developers, and users, shared their expertise in the field of rotating machines. Current trends and industrial applications - such as CO2 capture and utilization, and the intensification of conventional processes - played a central role. The HiGee technology attracts research enthusiasts worldwide and its relevance in various areas of process engineering increases. The meeting was organized by Prof. Andrzej Górak and Dr. J?rg Koop.

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Participants of the ROTOR colloquium.

CHISA-26

The 26th International Congress of Chemical Engineering (CHISA) took place from August 21-25, 2022, in Prague. CHISA 2022 marked the first in-person congress after a two-year hiatus because of the Covid pandemic. Three members of d|b|t|a contributed to the congress with oral presentations. These included a discussion of structure-activity correlations of bifunctional catalysts for direct CO2 conversion to dimethyl ether ( Mudassar Javed ), an autothermal reactor concept for oxidative coupling of methane ( Abigail Pérez Ortiz ), and the design of hybrid reactive distillation processes for the production of fatty acid isopropyl esters ( Hernán Darío Mu?oz Gil ). Results and ideas from our young researchers were greatly appreciated by the audience and were followed by fruitful scientific discussions.

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Our scientists at CHISA. From left to right: Mudassar Javed, Abigail Perez Ortiz, Hernan Dario Munoz Gil.

ProcessNet and DECHEMA-BioTechNet Annual Meeting

From September 12 to 15, 2022, we took part in the annual meeting of ProcessNet “(Bio)Process Engineering – a Key to Sustainable Development” in Aachen. d|b|t|a contributed two presentations and two posters: Karsten Duch spoke about the “Fast-track process development at mini-plant scale for the production of long chained amines using homogeneous catalysis in microemulsions” and Abigail Pérez Ortiz Pérez Ortiz gave insights into the “Implementation of Heat-integration Concepts for Autothermal Oxidative Coupling of Methane”. Besides, Gerardo Brand Rihm presented his results on ”Recipe optimization of batch distillation trajectories based on a data-driven model”, while Janina Deichl showed her achievements regarding “Semi-Empirical and Data-Driven Modelling of Two-Phase Flow in Capillary Tube”.

12th International Conference on Distillation and Absorption

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Our team for Toulouse. From left to right: Christian Hoffman, Innokentij Bogatykh, Hannes Raddant, Julian Wurm, Jens-Uwe Repke, Alexander Ressemann.

From September 18 to 21, 2022, we presented our current research at Distillation & Absorption in Toulouse, France, which is held every four years and was co-organized by Prof. Repke. Christian Hoffmann discussed his results on dynamic, pressure-driven modeling of distillation columns, while Alexander Ressemann gave a talk on a methodology for temperature measurement in rotating packed beds. Innokentij Bogatykh presented his latest results on an innovative control method for cyclic operation of reactive distillation columns. Hannes Raddant detailed the characterization of fluid dynamics of hanging film flows using light-induced fluorescence on his poster. Julian Wurm also presented a poster on the experimental investigation of wet oxidative gas desulfurization, focusing on operation strategies to avoid solid precipitation.

ProcessNet PAAT

Gerardo Brand Rihm and Karsten Duch were at the annual meeting of the DECHEMA working party PAAT in Frankfurt (Main) and presented research in the areas of machine learning and process intensification. Mr. Brand Rihm gave a talk on "Optimization of batch cycles using data-driven models and manipulated variable space reduction via operating concepts". Mr. Duch highlighted his work on an "Optimal reactor concept for the production of fatty amines: process intensification with cyclic semi-batch operation for reactions in microemulsions at mini-plant scale".


9 Events

d|b|t|a Student Days

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Student Day celebrations in d|b|t|a‘s ?Sm?land“.

A good working environment and a friendly and collegial atmosphere are key to good research and open discussions in science. That is why all students hired as student assistants or working on their thesis were invited to a d|b|t|a summer festival at the end of July and a near-christmas event in December to socialize and network. It was less about chemical processes or approaches to data-driven modelling, but personal development and non-academic topics dominated the evening. Nevertheless, we were very delighted with the commitment and interest that the students showed. Ultimately, we hope that this team spirit will facilitate further activities, both academic and non-academic, and improve even more collaborations within the group. The next d|b|t|a student event is certainly just around the corner.

d|b|t|a Alumni Reunion

On October 14, we celebrated the second d|b|t|a alumni reunion. On this day, all former members of our research group - professors, research assistants, technicians, lab and IT staff, secretaries - are invited to return and spend the day with us. Due to the pandemic, we had to postpone the event for more than two years, and we were of course very happy to finally hold this follow-up event in person at TU Berlin.

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Current and past d|b|t|a members in front of TK hall.

We started the meeting with plenary talks from various alumni from industry and research, which were moderated by Jens-Uwe Repke .

Patrick Schiffmann presented an overview of current membrane developments at Linde Engineering. David Müller gave insights into current measures, challenges, and opportunities for the digitalization of work processes at Evonik. Jan Sch?neberger described his research goals as a newly appointed professor of sustainable process engineering at the Berlin University of Applied Sciences Berlin. Our former colleague Joris Weigert (now BASF) presented our current activities in the areas of machine learning and data science.After the plenary talks, our PhD students presented their research in short elevator pitches and discussed current challenges. Afterwards, the alumni toured our lab facilities to take a look at the available test benches and miniplants. We ended the day with a nice get-together in a restaurant near the Schloss Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg Palace) during which open questions could be answered and new ideas could be discussed. Of course there was also time for a great buffet and a beer or two...

We would like to thank GWT | Wir Wissen Wie and the organizers Karsten Duch and Volodymyr Kozachynskyi for making this great event happen!

d|b|t|a Annual Retreat & Hiking Trip

On July 27 and 28, the annual strategy meeting of d|b|t|a as well as our hiking day took place. The strategy meeting serves to evaluate our internal processes and the strategic orientation of the research group and took place in person for the first time since 2019. There were critical and constructive discussions on various topics in small and large groups, e.g., the restructuring of our lab facilities. In the evening, we had a social event with barbecue and pub quiz.

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Group photo from the annual retreat, taken before the barbecue and a competitive pub quiz.


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Good mood during the hiking session.

The next morning, the group went on foot from the venue in Falkensee through Spandauer Forst and to the banks of the Havel. The two days ended with a dinner at the Jagdhaus Spandau. We thank all participants for the great discussions and different perspectives! We also say thanks to Christian Hoffmann and Hannes Raddant for organizing the event!



10 News from our Workshop

After the restrictions of the last few years, our workshop team is highly motivated to build new plants.

As one of them, an existing glass column was converted into a tray column. For this purpose, a compact design was created that could be inserted into the cylindrical glass sections. A particular challenge was the implementation of different measurement devices with the limited connection interfaces of the column sections. Many thanks to our colleagues Mr. Warsany and Mr. Vogel for the fast building of the plant.

At the same time, work was also carried out on rebuilding a reactive column that is now being used to separate ethanol and water. The column will be operated in batch mode. The evaporator was designed as part of the project and fabricated in the workshop. Thanks to the work of Mr. Warsawa, the column was quickly implemented, including an online method for concentration measurement.

Last but not least, a measurement cell for the determination of the separation efficiency of structured packings was realized by the head of our workshop, Dietmar Plotka, which included a huge effort in welding of the liquid distributors and the cell itself. Special thanks also to Martin Trinkaus for tackling electrics and always finding solutions for new sensor or automatization implementations.

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Hands-on impressions. From left to right: Jason Warsany, Dietmar Plotka, Tom Vogel.
Chukwuka Humphery Onuh

Trainee @ TenneT??? || Energy Engineer || Offshore || Driving Energy Transition || Grid Field Operations

1 年

Very detailed information in the newsletter in deed 2022 was a good year for dbta

Hannes Leuner

Chemical Engineer | Sustainability Consultant | Supporting businesses in achieving net-zero and sustainability goals

1 年

Sehr sch?ner Newsletter und in diesem Format sehr gut zug?nglich!

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