Immobilized-Enzyme Packed-Bed Reactor

This simulator models a real unit operation from industrial biotechnology: a packed-bed reactor filled with porous beads carrying immobilized enzyme, through which a substrate stream flows continuously. Because the enzyme sits inside the bead rather than free in solution, substrate must diffuse to reach it — a competition between reaction rate and diffusion rate captured by the Thiele modulus and the effectiveness factor, two of the core design numbers used when scaling up biocatalytic reactors for products from high-fructose corn syrup to biodiesel to semi-synthetic antibiotics. Adjust flow rate, bead size, enzyme loading and inlet concentration to see the axial concentration profile, outlet conversion, and internal diffusion limitation respond exactly as the governing equations predict.