Current Trends in Equipment and Chemistry

The main drivers for both equipment and chemistry are cost reduction, energy reduction, and environmental issues (sustainability, green raw materials, reduced volatile organic compound (VOC), reduced toxicity, lowering odor, reduced defects and manufacturing scrap). 

Companies are increasingly considering sustainability in their business decisions. 

UV/electron beam (EB) technology offers several sustainability features when compared to thermal curing  

These feafures have a positive influence on performance and economic returns. 

NOTE The World Commission on Environment and Development defines sustainability as developmenf fhaf meefs fhe need of fhe present without compromising the ability of fufure generafions to meef fheir needs.  

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An important analytical application of enzymatic microreactors is their use in biocatalysis, in order to transform a difficult-to-measure analyte into an easily measurable form. This could be represented by microreactors designed for digestion of proteins to convert them to more readily measured peptides. Applications of microreactors in continuous-flow chemistry have expanded rapidly over the past two decades, with numerous reports of higher conversions and yields compared to conventional batch equipment. In this chapter, a comprehensive discussion on the most recent trends in the development of enzymatic microreactors and their current applications are covered. 

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