woo hoo!! cazy ho!!

Welcome to CE, Anusha. It's a pleasure to have you with us. Good to see biotech engineers joining the site. We look forward to interesting Biotech related discussions from you. Make yourself comfortable here and feel free to participate in existing discussions.

Welcome Anusha. Late Prof.Kunthala Jayaraman, who started the Centre for biotechnology at Anna University in 1985, was a good friend. My son did his B.Tech from it long back.

I was a frequent visitor to the centre.

bioramaniWelcome Anusha. Late Prof.Kunthala Jayaraman, who started the Centre for biotechnology at Anna University in 1985, was a good friend. My son did his B.Tech from it long back.

I was a frequent visitor to the centre.

hello sir!!saw your profile . itz really a honor for a small girl getting noticed by a great man. my grand dad was a scientist in our army. he was the one who ignited me with the fire of biotechnology!! he was trying to bring extract gun powder from the caffine, but he couldnt. he is no more. but all his inspirational sayings are still with me. hope this would help me in achieving greater heights!!!!

anusha venkathe was trying to bring extract gun powder from the caffine, but he couldnt.

I am not sure about gunpowder from caffeine. But I spent time on extracting caffeine from tea waste. An interesting chemical engineering project.

oh!! that sounds interesting!! was the result positive???

bioramaniI am not sure about gunpowder from caffeine. But I spent time on extracting caffeine from tea waste. An interesting chemical engineering project.

I knew tea contains caffeine, but didn't know it's so hard to extract it. Does our body extract caffeine from tea? Isn't that the element that makes us feel energetic?

Eager to know why is it so hard to do so ??

The_Big_KI knew tea contains caffeine, but didn't know it's so hard to extract it. Does our body extract caffeine from tea? Isn't that the element that makes us feel energetic?

yes!!! our body takes the caffeine by absorption through small intestine. caffeine acts a neuro stimulant thus providing us alertness!!

Hello.! You seem to be a very "crazy Engineer". You can see many like minded people here.! Welcome Home.! 😀 And, gunpowder from caffeine? Wow, Such an amazing thing to think about.! Hope you reach great heights and contribute much here.!

The_Big_KI knew tea contains caffeine, but didn't know it's so hard to extract it. Does our body extract caffeine from tea? Isn't that the element that makes us feel energetic?

You are right. It is the caffeine that gives the 'lift'.
In a tea factory only the tip leaves are used for the product. The other parts that are removed as a waste contains 1 to 2% caffeine for dry weight. Usually the waste is burnt in the factory boiler to generate process steam as it is too expensive to extract the caffeine.
We set up a 10 cu.m. percolator, used the waste to generate steam and hot water, sprayed the extract through some 25 bath shower heads to evaporate bulk of the water recirculating the brew collected in big tanks below through a heat exchanger again heated by the waste burning boiler to get a water concentrate of caffeine and other solubles. This was counter current extracted with carbon tetra chloride(CTC) in a contactor, finally distilling off the CTC to get crude crystalline caffeine, which was purified by recrystallization.
All this had to be done without adversely impacting the beautiful Nilgiris environment.

Welcome to CE family. 😀