When the porous membrane, which has two surfaces of a surface A and a surface C, is equally divided in the thickness direction of the porous membrane into three layers of a first layer including the surface A, a second layer that is a central layer in the thickness direction, and a third layer including the surface C, an average trunk size of the third layer is larger than an average trunk size of the second layer, and when a continuous layer from the surface A having a thickness of 10 ?m in the first layer is a first layer component, a continuous layer component having a thickness of 10 ?m and an average trunk size smaller than an average trunk size of the first layer component is present in the first layer, the second layer, and the third layer other than the first layer component.

A composite filter aid may include diatomaceous earth, natural glass, and a precipitated silica binder, wherein the filter aid has a permeability ranging from 3 to 20 darcys. A composite filter aid may include diatomaceous earth, perlite, and a precipitated silica binder, wherein the filter aid has an alpha density less than 15 lbs/ft.sup.3. A method for making a composite material may include blending diatomaceous earth and perlite, adding alkali silicate to the blended diatomaceous earth and perlite, and precipitating the alkali silicate as a binder to make the composite material. A method for filtering a beverage may include using a composite filter aid and/or composite material.

A filter aid composition may include a first acid-treated silica-based filter aid having a first particle size distribution and a second acid-treated silica-based filter aid having a second particle size distribution. A method of making a filter aid composition may include providing a first silica-based filter aid having a first particle size distribution, providing a second silica-based filter aid having a second particle size distribution, and blending the first silica-based filter aid with the second silica-based filter aid to form the filter aid composition. A method of filtering a fluid may include providing a filter aid composition including a first acid-treated silica-based filter aid and a second acid-treated silica-based filter aid and filtering the fluid through the filter aid composition. The filter aid composition may have a multimodal particle size distribution such that the first particle size distribution has a d50 greater than the second particle size distribution.

A beer filter and a method of brewing beer is disclosed, the beer filter including an outer sheath, an outer permeable sheath disposed in the outer sheath, and an inner permeable sheath disposed in the outer permeable sheath. The method includes steps of disposing an outer permeable sheath within an outer sheath, filling an outer permeable sheath with hops, disposing an inner permeable sheath within the outer permeable sheath, and causing beer to flow from a vessel through and out of the inner permeable sheath, through the hops in the outer permeable sheath, out of the outer permeable sheath and into the outer sheath, and from the outer sheath and back into the vessel.

A multi-stage filtration system for heterogeneous food mixtures. The system comprises a tank for holding the heterogeneous mixture to be filtered. First and second filtering devices receive heterogeneous mixtures from the tank and divide them into a first (second) portion of mixture and a residual (second residual) portion of solid mixture. First and second feeding conduits and first and second connecting conduits between the tank and the first and second filtering devices feed the heterogeneous mixtures to the first and second filtering devices and the first and second portions of mixture to the tank, respectively. The first and the second filtering devices comprise tangential filtration filtering units comprising first filtering members of the membrane type, and second filtering members of the tubular type, respectively.

Embodiments described herein relate to methods and systems for dewatering alcoholic solutions via forward osmosis.

A composite filter aid may include diatomaceous earth, natural glass, and a precipitated silica binder, wherein the filter aid has a permeability ranging from 3 to 20 darcys. A composite filter aid may include diatomaceous earth, perlite, and a precipitated silica binder, wherein the filter aid has an alpha density less than 15 lbs/ft.sup.3. A method for making a composite material may include blending diatomaceous earth and perlite, adding alkali silicate to the blended diatomaceous earth and perlite, and precipitating the alkali silicate as a binder to make the composite material. A method for filtering a beverage may include using a composite filter aid and/or composite material.

Apparatus to filter liquor includes at least one woven layer. The layer comprises strands that are naturally produced by a living thing, include domains of hydrophilic amino acids, include domains of hydrophobic amino acids, have a triangular cross section to produce turbulent liquid flow, have weft threads parallel to other weft threads, have warp threads parallel to other warp threads at an angle to the weft threads, have at least one of the pair consisting of negatively charged amino acid and positively charged amino acids, and have a denier in the range of 0.75 to 1.25.

A process is shown for reducing the alcohol content and/or the sugar content of a beverage. The process includes wetting a predetermined amount of a particulate solid material with a predetermined amount of water, and contacting the beverage with the pre-wetted solid adsorbent material. The material selectively adsorbs alcohol, sugar, or alcohol and sugar from the beverage. The process can be carried out at a small scale and does not require any sophisticated equipment.

There is disclosed a system and method for processing wine and/or a containing barrel, while keeping a volume of most of the wine in the barrel. The disclosed system and method can provide reduced mixing of different layers of wine in the barrel. An optional scrubbing mechanism cleans an interior surface of the barrel from encrusted matter, and an optional UV sterilization light source sanitizes an interior surface of the barrel that is alongside a cavity in the barrel empty of wine. In some embodiments a pumping and filtering system preserves non-mixing flow of wine in the barrel while effectively filtering wine optionally without the use of a filter cartridge or other interposing medium.