The AVN Blog

A company wanted to test the performance of a number of custom-designed specialty surfactants. AVN prepared samples of these products by reaction of selected starter molecules with ethylene oxide and propylene oxide. Reaction parameters were varied in statistically designed experiments. The block copolymers produced were provided for application testing to… Read More

An Australian company experienced two explosions in its chemical manufacturing unit and made contact with AVN for assistance. Within 10 days of initial contact, AVN had assembled a project team and sent a contingent to Australia. The root cause of the incidents was identified and a revised process with inherent… Read More

A specialty monomer was identified by a customer as a target product from a proposed alkylation reaction. A fixed bed catalytic reactor was prepared and operated to investigate the details of the reaction. Products were collected, analyzed, and used to test purification by distillation. Results from a series of tests… Read More

A company was looking for alternative approaches to chemically convert a polymer to a unique specialty product of interest. AVN conceived of an approach that opens the polymer framework to allow the reaction to proceed more effectively. The process was evaluated over a range of conditions at laboratory scale and… Read More

A highly exothermic oxidation process using a fixed-bed heterogeneous catalyst was being investigated by a customer, who needed the capability of testing the catalyst at pilot scale. AVN charged the catalyst to our MAN Diesel & Turbo molten salt tubular reactor with three independent zones for temperature control. Reactor tubes… Read More