Agglomeration / instantization

Food industry - for example: pectin

Pectin is a thickener that is frequently used in the food industry. Usually made of citrus fruit or apples, it is available as fine powder. Because of the fine-grained structure and gelation features of wet pectin it will immediately lump in water and can be dissolved again only by raising the temperature and applying mechanical force.

For some applications (e.g. ice cream) it is not possible to use warm water. In this case instant pectin is used. This is agglomerated pectin with water used as binder. Due to the coarse-grained and open-pore structure water is able to get to the surface of each individual pectin particle, ensuring smooth dissolution even in case of low temperatures.

Food industry - for example: baby cereal

Baby cereal mainly consists of the components milk powder, cereal products, fruit powder, vitamins and sometimes sugar. These components have to be mixed evenly to ensure that every helping has the same taste and consistency.

Because of the clearly different grain sizes (partly flake-like cereal products, fine vitamin powder) a homogenous mixture is difficult to achieve. Moreover, the components tend to get unmixed during transport.

In the fluidized bed not only a homogenous mixture of all components is achieved, but the product is also agglomerated by spraying it with water.  Therefore, the fine-grained components are fixedly bound to the coarser ones. Subsequently, unmixing is prevented. Additionally, the instantaneous dispersion features are clearly improved, i.e. the baby cereal can be prepared more easily.

Detergent industry - for example: particulate matter

Drying a crystalline product will produce filter dust. Although the dust has all the chemical and physical properties of the product, it cannot be sold because it is too fine. Agglomerating it with a binder immediately turns it into a high-grade product.