Process Intensification Strategies of Foam Fractionation and Its Applications in Food Industry

Foam fractionation is a green and economical primary separation technique and it has excellent application prospect in the field of food industry. However, it is difficult to simultaneously obtain the high values of enrichment ratio and recovery percentage in a batch operation of foam fractionation due to the opposite effects of operating parameters on interfacial adsorption and foam drainage. In order to solve this problem, multiple process intensification strategies of foam fractionation are developed. In this work, the current studies on the intensification methods of interfacial adsorption and foam drainage were firstly reviewed. The advantages and disadvantages of these methods are analyzed. Subsequently, the research progress of foam fractionation in the separation of proteins, enzymes, saponins, polyphenols and biological preservatives are summarized. Based on the literature review and problem analysis, three future research respects are proposed to promote the industrial application of foam fractionation: Developing new methods which would simultaneously improve interfacial adsorption and foam drainage, designing new collectors with strong binding specificity for non-surface-active materials and good reusability, and inhibiting protein denaturation during desorption process.