Hollow fibres with walls filled with hydrogels

Although extractions using hollow fibres can be faster and more efficient than those carried out in more conventional equipment, such as mixer/separators, accidental convection through the pores in the fibre walls can compromise these advantages. A way of overcoming this drawback is to fill the walls of the fibres with a gel, such as crosslinked polyvinyl alcohol. The overall mass transfer is unaltered but the convection through the pores is eliminated.