Mechanism of clogging by exchange flow of a spinfilter as filtrating centrifuge

Perfusion cultures usually reach high cell densities and, therefore, require a spinfilter for cellular retention. But spinfilters may clog prematurely so we decided to study the process by pumping a suspension culture through the filter, so that the cells are trapped inside and the clarified flow-through can be measured by collecting it in a measuring cylinder until partial or total obstruction of the filter, which in this case is used as a filtrating centrifuge. Filtrate volume with time was measured at several cellular concentrations and rotational speeds, calculating the behavior of specific resistance for the apparent cake, the resistance of the filtration medium, cake porosity and hydrodynamic regime. The results were used to adjust the filtration profile.