ABSTRACT
Mathematical modelling is a powerful tool in process design, assessment and optimisation. For a given situation it is very important to identify a mathematical model with
an adequate functional form, but even the more complex model is of little use if the model parameters are not known with precision and accuracy. The estimation of kinetic parameters from experimental data involves the application of statistical methods in two phases: experimental design
put on the latter, one should realise that the general value of the information contained in the data is actually established when the experiments are designed and even a very careful data analysis is unable to recover information that is not present in the data (1, 2). As Lenz and Lund (3) stressed, much of the data currently found in the literature could have been obtained with considerable less effort by proper choice of experimental conditions. Furthermore, the lack of quality of the experimental data many times compromises the precision and accuracy of the parameters estimates. This is of utmost importance when microbiological or chemical model parameters are used in process design, assessment or optimisation (4).
