Packed-bed Tube or Capillary Micro Reactors

When performing catalytic reactions or reactions with immobilized reactants, a bed or support has to be fiUed into a tube or capillary. The fiUing may be a bed of powder, a bed of granules or a three-dimensional material network (e.g. a polymerized foam). By special choice of the filling, e.g. very regularly sized particles, it is attempted to improve the flow characteristics. 

These filled tubes or capillaries hence are mini fixed beds with internal micro flow regions. Such approach is a link between real micro structured units and conventional equipment. The type of processing may be analogous to conventional processing, e.g. fixed-bed or trickle-bed operation. 

---