PROCESS AND EQUIPMENT FOR CHROMATOGRAPHIC SEPARATION OF FRUCTOSE/DEXTROSE SOLUTIONS

摘要

An improved process for separating a fluid feed stream containing a mixture of substances (fructose and dextrose solutions) into a plurality of streams richer in one or more of the substances by alternately passing the mixed fluid feed stream and an elution fluid stream through a chromatographic separation column to obtain an effluent stream. She column has a chamber containing an adsorbent which has a selective affinity for one of the substances in the fluid feed stream so that portions of the effluent stream have higher concentrations of one of the substances. Thereafter, separate successive portions are collected of the effluent stream having higher concentrations of at least one of the substances. The process involves first densely packing the adsorbent in the chamber of the separation column, and the chamber is devoid of any internal flow distributing structure. The adsorbent is such that it contracts to a reduced volume in the presence of a selected reagent, and swells when the excess of concentrated reagent is removed. The adsorbent is disposed in the separation column chamber in its reduced volume condition and is effectively confined in the chamber of the separation column. She excess of the concentrated reagent is removed from the adsorbent so that the adsorbent swells to completely and uniformly pack the separation column chamber and thus eliminates channeling and turbulent flow, and improves the uniformity of the crosssectional flow rate across the column chamber. The process provides one output stream rich in fructose and another output stream rich in dextrose.