Damiano Rossi

Damiano Rossi obtained a BS degree in Chemical Engineering and an MS degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Pisa. He worked carrying out research on the novel synthesis of new energetic copolymer binders and then on adhesive membranes at the Department of Material Science (DICCISM) of Pisa. Damiano joined the UCL’s Department of Chemical Engineering as a PhD student in 2013.

Research project

Title: Sonocrystallization in continuous flow microchannel contactors

In this research, we will enable development of novel systems for particle production of relevance to the pharmaceutical industries. The overall aim is to combine continuous flow processing and sonication technologies, for addressing key challenges in pharmaceuticals manufacture. Controllability, reproducibility and reliable scale-up of crystallisation processes are hampered owing to the complex interaction of various key processes, including nucleation, growth and aggregation. Seeding and grinding have been employed conventionally to address these issues, without always achieving the desired product quality.

In this study, we seek to develop a new multidisciplinary strategy to address these challenges and to provide products with improved quality in terms of particle size, particle morphology and particle size distribution. We propose to tackle these issues by a) exploiting the additional degrees of freedom that sonocrystallisation offers, b) taking advantage of the enhanced control of mass/heat transfer and fluid dynamics inherent in small channel flow reactors and c) decoupling in the spatial domain the various stages of crystallisation.

Education

BS in Chemical Engineering, University of Pisa, Italy
MSc in Chemical Engineering, University of Pisa, Italy