Scale-up

Scale-up is the adaptation of a process from smaller to larger production scale while preserving its performance. It requires accounting for changes in equipment, transport, and operating conditions.

Dimensional analysis: A method that uses dimensions and dimensionless groups to relate physical quantities and compare systems. It identifies which combinations of variables govern similarity between small and large processes.
Chemical engineering: The engineering discipline concerned with designing and operating processes that transform materials through chemical and physical changes. Its design methods connect laboratory reactions to industrial production equipment.
Numbering up: Increasing total production by operating multiple small units in parallel instead of enlarging one unit. It avoids some size-dependent changes by repeating equipment, but adds parallelization challenges.
Economies of scale: Cost advantages that arise when increasing production lowers the average cost per unit. Scale-up seeks these savings, but equipment and operating constraints can limit them.
Geometric similarity: A relationship between objects whose corresponding dimensions have the same ratios. Maintaining shape ratios is one way to preserve equipment and flow patterns during enlargement.
Bioprocess engineering: The engineering of processes that use cells, enzymes, or biological systems to make products or perform transformations. Living production systems are especially sensitive to mixing, oxygen supply, and shear during enlargement.
Scale-down model: A smaller experimental system designed to reproduce selected conditions found in a large production process. It reverses the usual direction of scale-up to investigate large-scale behavior with less material.
Manufacturing yield: The fraction of input material converted into acceptable product during manufacturing. Small losses in yield can become costly when production volumes rise.
Reynolds number: A dimensionless quantity comparing inertial forces with viscous forces in fluid flow. Matching it can help reproduce flow regimes, though it may conflict with other scale-up goals.
Pharmaceutical manufacturing: The regulated production of medicines and their active ingredients. Scale-up must preserve product quality while meeting manufacturing controls and regulatory requirements.

Linked from 7 pages