A Century of Research in Sedimentation and Thickening

Abstract

This paper provides a concise review of the contributions to research in sedimentation and thickening that were made during the 20th century, starting from the invention of the Dorr thickener in 1905. The different steps of progress that were made in understanding batch sedimentation and continuous thickening processes in mineral processing are reviewed. A major breakthrough was Kynch’s kinematic sedimentation theory published in 1952. The authors’ own contributions to sedimentation and thickening research are summarized, including the development of the appropriate mathematical framework for Kynch’s theory and its extensions to continuous sedimentation and to polydisperse suspensions of spheres. An even more general model framework is provided by the phenomenological theory of sedimentation, which permits the description and simulation of the transient behavior of flocculent suspensions.