Ultrasound Technology

Hielscher Ultrasound Technology

Hielscher Ultrasonics develops and manufactures a wide range of ultrasonic devices used for lab samples, pilot scale processing or full scale production. This includes devices for the ultrasonication of any liquid volume, from microlitres to 2000 litres per hour.

Please contact us for further information on the complete Hielscher collection and prices. A wide range of applications and uses of these ultrasonic devices are known. These include: .

• Homogenizing: Dispersing, De-agglomeration, Emulsifying, Wet Milling and Grinding
• Disintegration: Cell Extraction, Hot water Disinfection
• Sonochemistry: Transesterification (Biodiesel)
• Degassing :Leak Detection (Bottles and Cans)
• Cleaning: wires and strips

One of the fastest growing and most significant areas of interest employing ultra sonic devices is in the transesterification of oil to biodiesel. Please click here to see our separate Bio-fuel webpage. Alternatively, please contact our office and speak to us about Hielscher and these products can benefit you.

When sonicating liquids at high intensities, the sound waves that propagate into the liquid media result in alternating high-pressure (compression) and low-pressure (rarefaction) cycles, with rates depending on the frequency. During the low-pressure cycle, high-intensity ultrasonic waves create small vacuum bubbles or voids in the liquid. When the bubbles attain a volume at which they can no longer absorb energy, they collapse violently during a high-pressure cycle. This phenomenon is termed cavitation. During the implosion very high temperatures (approx. 5,000K) and pressures (approx. 2,000atm) are reached locally. The implosion of the cavitation bubble also results in liquid jets of up to 280m/s velocity. It is this process of expanding and collapsing bubbles alongs with the high speeds generated from the propagating waves that produce such efficient mixing

At Scientific & Medical Products Ltd. we carry the entire Hielscher range which can be loosly split into two catagories. Laboratory, and Industrial devices. The Lab devices range from small handheld systems for mixing and homogenizing small volumes of liquid, up to larger stand and clamp held devices which can process a flow of up to 50 litres per hour. The Industrial devices are tailored more towards small scale production devices for personal bio-fuel production, to large industrial scale for production scales up to 2000 L per hour.

Designed for the Lab:

Compact and extremely versatile, they can be used for the processing of a variety of organic and inorganic materials in a wide range of volumes. Typical applications of ultrasonic homogenizers include sample preparation, disintegrating and cell lysis, homogenizing, dispersing and disaggregation, particle size reduction and the acceleration of chemical reactions (sonochemistry).

They are very simple to setup. The handheld and standmounted devices combine generator (power supply) and transducer (converter) in a single housing. This saves desktop space and weight. Hielscher is the only manufacturer of handheld ultrasonic processors. The only plug to be connected is the main power plug, that fits into standard 230V outlet. The operation of the ultrasonic homogenizers is very simple. The devices are tuned to the optimal resonant frequency automatically, so there is no need for manual adjustments. The ultrasonic amplitude is adjustable from 20 through 100%. Alternatively to the continuous operation a cycle of intense sonication bursts can be a adjusted, e.g. for the sonication of heat-sensitive tissue.

Flow Cell Reactors for Larger Volume Processing:

The UP200S device can run continuously - 24hrs/7days, if needed. By using the laboratory devices in combination with flow cell reactors, you can process larger sample volumes. In this case, the liquid is pumped into the reactor made of glass or stainless steel. For example, a UP400S (400 watts) can process approx. 10 to 50 litres per hour. There it is exposed to defined intense sonication before it reaches the exit of the reactor cell. In order to cool heat-sensitive material during sonication, the flow cells are jacketed to improve heat dissipation .

Please contact us for further information on the complete Hielscher Lab collection, prices, availability, or just if you would like to discuss in more detail.

Built for Industry:

Equipment requirements change, when you take processes from the research lab to the production level. Processing volumes rise; processing costs matter; processing quality becomes a key target. Other factors, such as equipment reliability or energy efficiency may become important, too.

Hielscher industrial ultrasonic devices are powerful, efficient and reliable. They are built to operate continuously at high load in industrial environments up to 16kW per device. Power requirement rises with the volume or flow to be processed and although the laboratory devices are capable of handling up to one ton per day, this may not be sufficient for production processes.

Hielscher is the leading ultrasonics supplier for industrial liquid processing applications, such as, the dispersing & milling of pigments in paints or inks, formulation of high performance coatings with nanomaterials, manufacturing of biodiesel or the pasteurization of food or beverage

Outstanding Power and Efficiency

Ultrasonic output power is a key factor for process scale-up. In order to process larger volumes in a given amount of time, you need to deploy more power. The power per device ranges from 500 watts to 16 kilowatts. For typical liquid processing applications, four or more units are combined in clusters for enhanced redundancy and capacity adaptability. For example, a cluster of 6xUIP10000 (60kW) may be used for the processing of up to 50 cubic meters of biodiesel per hour!

High power equipment uses more electricity. Considering rising energy prices, this affects the costs of processing. For this reason, it is important, that the equipment does not lose much energy in the conversion of electricity into mechanical output. Hielscher ultrasonic processors have and outstanding efficiency of >85%. This reduces your electricity costs and gives you more processing performance.

Recommended Literature and further reading

José A. Colucci, Ernesto E. Borrero, and Fabio Alape: Biodiesel from an Alkaline Transesterification Reaction of Soybean Oil Using Ultrasonic Mixing, in JAOCS, Vol. 82, no. 7 (2005).

N.G. Siatis, A.C. Kimbaris, C.S. Pappas, P.A. Tarantilis, and M.G. Polissiou: Improvement of Biodiesel roduction Based on the Application of Ultrasound: Monitoring of the Procedure by FTIR Spectroscopy, in JAOCS, Vol. 83, no. 1 (2006).

Jan Lifka and Bernd Ondruschka: Influence of Mass Transfer on the Production of Biodiesel, in: Chem. Eng. Technol. 2004, 27, No. 11.

Ning Zhu* and Takashi Tsuchiya: Study on Synthesizing BDF by Using Ultrasonic Sonochemistry Effect, from 3rd International Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, 15 - 18 August 2005, San Francisco, California, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

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