Considering Nucleation, Breakage and Aggregation in Morphological Population Balance Models for Crystallization Processes

Abstract Morphological population balance (PB) models incorporate crystal shape information into PB simulations so that the shape of any crystal at any moment can be fully reconstructed. This study extended the morphological PB model by considering crystal nucleation, breakage and aggregation, which have not been previously considered in morphological PB. It was assumed that the size of a nucleus is infinitely small and that it exhibits a shape only due to facet growth and that the breakage and aggregation of crystals can result in size changes in one coordinate direction at a time. Potash alum crystallization was used as a case study to illustrate a modelling approach.