Stability Conditions and Observer Design for a Continuous Crystallizer

The population balance equation is used to describe the dynamics of a continuous crystallizer. A simple condition to guarantee the stability of a mixed suspended mixed product removal crystallizer is derived based on the population balance. A novel discretization scheme solves the population balance and the resulting discretized population balance is shown to be equivalent to the original population balance. The obtained condition is tested by simulations of the crystallization process. Furthermore an observer based estimator is developed to estimate the crystal growth rate and the simulation results show that the estimator is able to track its true value.