Our graduate student Furkan Aytekin has completed his master's thesis titled by ''Filtration performance of ceramic membranes at whey processing and risk assessment of end-product''

In thesis content, the experimental investigations were carried out to evaluate the performance of ceramic UF technology in whey powder production in an experimental matrix and for large-scale applicability. For this purpose, the performances of disc and tubular ceramic membranes with a molecular weight cut-off value (MWCO) of 15 kDa were firstly carried out at a whey feed temperature of 40C. In the second step, the tubular ceramic membranes with 15 kDa MWCO were tested at different feed temperatures (25-40-60-80C) to increase the final product quality of the whey powder obtained from the concentrate stream of the membranes. In the third step of the work, the process of pre-filtration with a 50 kDa ceramic membrane was applied before a 15 kDa ceramic membrane to increase the overall filtration efficiency. In the fourth step of the work, the test for pathogenic organisms and analysis of hormones, antibiotics and heavy metals on the final product were carried out for risk assessment/evaluation of the whey product. The freeze drying process was applied to obtain the whey powder with the optimum results from all filtration tests. This thesis work was financially supported by TUBİTAK-ARDEB 1002 program with 119Y026 project number.

Furkan continues his career at Ortadogu Energy as Gas Production Engineer (http://linkedin.com/in/furkan-aytekin-435a58143).