Pharmaceuticals are emerging contaminants in waste waters from where they are discharged into surface water, so they may be harmful to aquatic organisms.

Collagen is one of the predominant proteins found in all multicellular animals. In this paper, the performance of the ultrafiltration process (UF) for concentrating the collagen protein was studied by performing batch experiments using a membrane module with an effective area of 28 cm 2 and equipped with a regenerated cellulose membrane with a molecular weight cutoff of 5 kDa. The feed solution consisted of aqueous solutions of bovine collagen hydrolysate with a molecular weight of 10 kDa. The effects of feed concentration (1%, 2%, 3%, 4%, and 5%) on the performance were determined. The optimum operating conditions were: a transmembrane pressure of 5 bar and a temperature of 25 C. The results showed that the permeability decreases with the increase of the volumetric concentration factor (VCF) for all five concentrated solutions of collagen tested. Also, the rejection of proteins increases with the increase in the concentration of the collagen solutions. The study confirms that the clogging phenomenon was dependent on the increase of concentration. Further, a mathematical modeling of fouling mechanism was analyzed based on Hermia's model. The concentration of the collagen solutions was also highlighted by viscosity measurements.

Contemporary Project Management has conceived tools based on mathematical models for planning, scheduling and controlling the projects, the costs and resources. Critical Path Method (CPM) and Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) are two network-based methods which were independently developed to assist the project managers in order to schedule complex real-life projects. A scheduling of a small-scale R&D project using these optimization time-oriented methods was accomplished. In many models of project network some activities are closely related to each other such as procurement activities of basic resources and research activities. If this precedence relationship is on the critical path, that means without no event slack or float time for activities, then some procurements delay may cause lag in the project’s completion time. Thus a good estimation for procurement and research activities duration is needed for a Just-in-Time project.

Tangential flow filtration of the collagen protein solutions with a molecular weight 12, 14, and 24 kDa is investigated using flat sheet membranes. The effects of tangential ultrafiltration (UF) on the permeate properties using two regenerated celluloses (RCs) and two polyethersulfone (PES) membranes with molecular weight cut‐off (MWCO) of 5 and 10 kDa are reported. The permeate and concentrate obtained in the UF experiments are characterized from a physical–chemical point of view by determining the temperature, pH, electrical conductivity, nitrogen content, and protein concentration. In addition, the experimental data are modeled using Hermia's model. The UF experiments demonstrated that permeate flux declined with increasing molecular weight of collagen at constant concentration (1%). Regardless of the molecular weight of collagen, the rejections decrease in the following order: PES 5 kDa > RC5kDa > RC10kDa > PES10kDa. In case of membrane with higher MWCO, the clogging phenomenon is mainly due to the blockage of the internal pores of the membrane than the formation of a polarization layer. Morphologies and characteristics of the membranes are characterized using scanning electron microscopy.