Forest Sciences Commons^™

Goali/Iucp: Prediction Of Wood Pulp K-Number With Neural Networks, Mohamad T. Musavi, Daniel Coughlin

University of Maine Office of Research Administration: Grant Reports

Lignin holds wood fibers together, and must be removed to produce high strength pulp for kraft paper. The Kappa- or K-number indicates the degree of lignin removal by a pulping process, and is probably the key variable for measuring quality in this process. A difficulty is that it is an off-line measurement. More importantly, there is usually a four hour process delay between when raw materials enter a pulping digester and when the K-number is measured. This makes modeling and control difficult. This Grant Opportunity for Academic Liaison with Industry project uses neural network models to predict K-number as a …