Acoustophoretic devices and methods for concentrating targeted biological cells in a reduced volume using multi-dimensional acoustic standing waves are disclosed. The methods include flowing a mixture of a host fluid and the biological cells through an acoustophoretic device. The acoustophoretic devices include an inlet, an outlet, and a flow chamber having an ultrasonic transducer-reflector pair. Biological cells, such as T cells, are separated from a host fluid for utilization in allergenic or autologous cell therapies. The disclosed devices and methods are capable of concentrating biological cells to at least 100 times their original cell concentration. The disclosed methods and devices are further capable of decreasing an original feed volume to a final concentrated volume that is less than one percent of the original feed volume.

A cavitation reactor having a pulse valve for receiving an input fluid flow and generating a pulsed output flow that is provided to the input of a resonance chamber, such as a tube. The pulse valve uses a shaft with a number of regularly spaced lands to form fluid conduits between an input port and the output port connected to the resonance tube to cause fluid communication between the input and output ports to be regularly opened and closed, thereby producing a pulsed output that drives the formation of resonance waves in the resonance chamber. The shaft is rotated at a suitable frequency to produce cavitation bubbles that collapse in the resonance chamber without damaging the valve shaft.

An apparatus includes a flow chamber having at least one inlet and at least one outlet. At least one ultrasonic transducer is located on a wall of the flow chamber, which operates to create a multi-dimensional acoustic standing wave in the flow chamber. A reflector is located on the wall on the opposite side of the flow chamber from the at least one ultrasonic transducer. The reflector is formed from a thin structure that provides a pressure release boundary, such as a plastic film/air interface.

A water treatment system and method. Influent water produced from an oil and gas production or the like is circulated in a multistage unit where the water is treated by degassing the water by saturating the water with air, stripping volatile compounds from the water, evaporating non-aqueous phase liquid petroleum from the water, repeatedly stripping and equilibrating inorganic carbons in the water, subliming semi-solids from the water, and breaking colloids in the water using continuous cavitation. Water from the multistage unit is clarified through floatation and sedimentation and biological material in the water is inactivated using irradiation. Water is then filtered before being provided as treated water for an application specific process such as electro desalination reversal, fracking reuse, or other wastewater recovery.

A system having improved trapping force for acoustophoresis is described where the trapping force is improved by manipulation of the frequency of the ultrasonic transducer. The transducer includes a ceramic crystal. The crystal may be directly exposed to fluid flow. The crystal may be air backed, resulting in a higher Q factor.

A demulsification process for extracting surface active biochemical products from crude oil and its fractions when they are used as feedstock during biochemical productions utilizes subcritical/supercritical CO.sub.2 as a proton pump. The process also includes a pH tuning step, thereby inducing demulsification and precipitation of biochemical products into the aqueous phase, but avoiding asphaltene precipitation by apriori addition of resinous solvents derived from crude oil or bioresources. The biochemical products are then extracted from the aqueous phase via temperature change or some other technique.

A method of treating contaminated materials such as oil and gas production waste sludges to recover crude oil hydrocarbons. The method includes the inversion of water-in-oil emulsions, and subsequent separation steps. These may involve the separation and removal of asphaltenes, petroleum waxes and/or solid particles from the crude oil hydrocarbons. The treatment method uses the physical phenomena of hydrodynamic cavitation and hydraulic shock, which produce different effects upon a mixture of water and the contaminated material being treated. These are deployed either as single or combined stage(s) of treatment or as a repeated series of single/combined treatment stages, with or without additional processing operations between each single/combined treatment stage. The method may be implemented with suitable plant including hydrodynamic cavitation units (103, 106) and hydraulic shock units (104, 107), followed by separators (105, 108).

A water treatment system and method. Influent water produced from an oil and gas production or the like is circulated in a multistage unit where the water is treated by degassing the water by saturating the water with air, stripping volatile compounds from the water, evaporating non-aqueous phase liquid petroleum from the water, repeatedly stripping and equilibrating inorganic carbons in the water, subliming semi-solids from the water, and breaking colloids in the water using continuous cavitation. Water from the multistage unit is clarified through floatation and sedimentation and biological material in the water is inactivated using irradiation. Water is then filtered before being provided as treated water for an application specific process such as electro desalination reversal, fracking reuse, or other wastewater recovery.

A working solution is prepared using an amphiphilic emulsifier, water, and a cosolvent as raw materials, so that a microemulsion with specific components is first formed in a supercritical fluid. Then, the system conditions are gradually changed to perform phase separation, thereby obtaining the structural color system. Patterns of different shapes can be further obtained by controlling different pressure and temperature conditions. In the present invention, structural colors are generated based on supercritical microemulsion phase separation, realizing non-pigment coloration of a solution system. In addition, patterns of different shapes can be obtained by controlling process conditions, so the present invention has good application markets and prospects in fields such as related display or light-shielding devices and other coloration applications. The structural color system obtained in the present invention has flexible characteristics and can be used in the field of flexible wearables.