Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413

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Applied Thermal Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apthermeng

Thermal optimisation of polymer extrusion using in-process

monitoring techniques
Javier Vera-Sorroche a, Adrian Kelly a, *, Elaine Brown a, Phil Coates a, Nayeem Karnachi b,
Eileen Harkin-Jones b, Kang Li c, Jing Deng c
a
Polymer IRC, School of Engineering, Design and Technology, University of Bradford, Bradford BD7 1DP, UK
b
School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Queen’s University Belfast, Belfast BT9 5AH, UK
c
School of Electronics, Electrical Engineering and Computer science, Queen’s University Belfast, Belfast BT9 5BN, UK

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Polymer extrusion is an energy intensive process, which is often run at less than optimal conditions. The
Received 12 December 2011 extrusion process consists of gradual melting of solid polymer by thermal conduction and viscous
Accepted 4 April 2012 shearing between a rotating screw and a barrel; as such it is highly dependent upon the frictional,
Available online 24 April 2012
thermal and rheological properties of the polymer. Extruder screw geometry and extrusion variables
should ideally be tailored to suit the properties of individual polymers, but in practice this is rarely
Keywords:
achieved due to the lack of understanding of the process. Here, in-process monitoring techniques have
Polymer extrusion
been used to characterise the thermal dynamics of the extrusion process. Novel thermocouple grid
Melt temperature
Energy
sensors have been used to measure melt temperature fields within flowing polymer melts at the
Optimisation entrance to an extruder die in conjunction with infra-red thermometers and real-time quantification of
energy consumption. A commercial grade of polyethylene has been examined using three extruder screw
geometries at different extrusion operating conditions to understand the process efficiency. Extruder
screw geometry, screw rotation speed and set temperature were found to have a significant effect on the
thermal homogeneity of the melt and process energy consumed.
Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY license.

1. Introduction The extruder is arguably the single most important piece of

Polymer processing is an energy intensive industrial sector, due
to the need to melt, mix, form and solidify polymeric materials in
large quantities at high throughputs. European plastics production
totalled 55 million tonnes in 2009, 24% of the global total, and
worldwide production has grown steadily for several decades. The
packaging sector accounts for the largest proportion of polymer
production (40.1% in 2009), with construction, automotive and
electronics also accounting for significant consumption of poly-
meric materials. In Europe alone it is estimated that more than 1.6
million people work in the polymer conversion industry in over
50,000 companies, many in SMEs (small and medium-sized enter-
prises), generating turnover in the region of 300 billion Euros per
year [1]. For a typical UK plastics company the electricity bill is
usually between 1 and 3% of turnover, which amounts to £380
million per annum for the UK in electricity costs. It has been shown
by Kent et al. [2] that simple no cost or low cost energy practices can
reduce energy consumption by between 10 and 20%.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ44 (0) 1274 234532; fax: þ44 (0) 1274 234529.
E-mail address: A.L.Kelly@bradford.ac.uk (A. Kelly).
polymer processing machinery [3,4]. The majority of polymer
processing steps involve extrusion and this stage typically repre-
sents around 50% of the total process energy. An extruder consists
of an Archimedean screw rotating within a heated barrel, gradually
melting polymeric granules or powder and conveying this melt to
a die where it is formed into shape. Polymer is melted by the dual
action of electrical heaters along the length of the barrel and
viscous shearing by the rotation of the screw. For each kg of poly-
mer processed it is necessary to supply, on average, 0.3 kW/kg/h [2].
A typical polymer processing plant will consist of polymer drying
equipment, polymer processing machines, chiller units for cooling
water and compressors for conveying materials and service air.
Despite the high intensity of thermal energy utilised within the
polymer processing industry, extrusion processes are commonly
run at less than optimal conditions due to a number of factors.
Often there is a lack of understanding of process conditions and
their relation to product quality and energy consumption. As
a result, extrusion processes are operated at conservative rates to
minimise process disturbances; long set-up and downtimes can
occur due to difficulties in selecting operating parameters [5].
Historically there has been little interest in operating with process

1359-4311 Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY license.

doi:10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2012.04.013
406 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413
energy consumption in mind, so the effects of processing condi-
tions on energy consumption are not well understood and gener-
ally extruders are not equipped with energy monitoring
equipment. Often extruders are operated with extruder screw
geometries, which are not suited to the polymer being used, either
through lack of understanding or financial restrictions.
The quality of extruded polymer is highly dependent upon the
homogeneity of the molten polymer being fed into the die, which
should ideally be supplied at a constant pressure, temperature and
throughput. Another difficulty faced by the industry is that the
temperature of flowing polymer melt is inherently difficult to
quantify without adversely affecting the flow. To address this
measurement need, a number of real-time melt temperature
measurement techniques have been developed, primarily more
suited to research rather than a production environment. These are
discussed in more detail in the following section. The aims of this
work were to relate thermal energy consumption of the single
screw extrusion process to operating conditions and screw geom-
etry. The reported study forms part of a wider research project to
provide the polymer industry with tools to optimise energy effi-
ciency using a whole systems approach.
2. Polymer melt temperature measurement
Single screw extruders are controlled by setting barrel and die
temperatures and screw rotation speed. Melt temperature is widely
acknowledged as being one of the key variables in polymer extru-
sion which directly influences process stability and product quality
[4]. However, most extruders are supplied with only wall temper-
ature measurement capability, usually through a thermocouple
flush mounted at the extruder die wall. Such sensors have been
shown to be heavily dependent upon the temperature of the metal
wall rather than the flowing melt [6], although slight improvements
can be obtained by using thermocouples embedded in an insulating
medium, such as a ceramic. Protruding thermocouples have also
been used in an attempt to measure the melt temperature profile,
but these have the disadvantage of disturbing the process flow and
hence risking weld lines in the extruded product [7]. Traversing
thermocouples are also subject to conduction errors along the
length of the sensor and shear heating around the tip. Several
techniques have been reported whereby a number of thermocou-
ples have been mounted on a supporting structure to measure
temperature radially across the melt flow but these also suffer from
disturbance of the melt streamlines and slow response times [8,9].
Sensors based on grids of thermocouple wires placed within the
melt flow have been used to generate detailed information con-
cerning melt temperature profiles and temperature variation
[10,12]. These thermocouple meshes use unsheathed thermocouple
wires with small diameters to minimise the flow disturbance and
reduce response time. Wires of opposing polarity are fused
together to form thermocouple junctions whose e.m.f. is related to
Table 1
Summary of temperature measurement methods.
Method Comments
Wall mounted TC Bulk measurement, dominated by wall temperature
Protruding TC Temperature profile, interruptions of the melt flow,
conduction error in length and shear heating around the tip
Traversing TC Temperature profile, subject to conduction and shear heating errors
TC mesh Multiple readings, provide a 2D profile of the temperature
Infra-red Bulk measurement over a conical volume near to the wall,
measurement dependent upon material type
Ultrasound Bulk measurement across the centreline of entire flow,
requires careful calibration due to changes with pressure and material type
Fluorescence Temperature profile, dependent upon material type
measured temperature at that point. Using such techniques the
effect of extruder screw speed, polymer type and screw geometry
have been measured [12]. The fragility of such sensors restrict their
use to research rather than production environments.
Infra-red (IR) sensors offer a non-intrusive, fast response method
of polymer melt temperature measurement. Typical response times
of infra-red sensors are around 10 ms and several studies have re-
ported their use in polymer extrusion, mainly using sensors flush
mounted to the surface of the extruder die [13e15]. Measurements
from infra-red sensors can provide some information about melt
temperature within a flowing melt, however the effective penetra-
tion depth of this technique is difficult to quantify and has been
shown to depend heavily on the emissivity of the polymer melt under
measurement [13]. Such sensors can be used in production envi-
ronments although the cost of the devices and the fragility of optical
fibres and electronics limit their use. Measurement techniques based
on alternative physical principles have also been developed to
measure polymer melt temperatures, such as ultrasound [16] or
fluorescence spectroscopy [17], but the cost of the systems and
complexity of calibration and analysis has limited their use. A
summary of these measurement techniques is shown in Table 1:
The work reported in this study utilises the thermocouple grid
technique and infra-red temperature measurement combined with
real-time quantification of energy consumption to investigate
thermal optimisation of the extrusion process.
3. Experimental
All measurements were carried out on a 63.5 mm diameter
single screw extruder (Davis Standard BC60). A linear high density
polyethylene (Ineos HD5050EA) was used throughout the studies
which has a quoted melt flow index (MFI) of 4.0 g/10 min (2.16 kg,
190  C). A comparison of shear viscosity measured using capillary
rheometer is shown in Fig. 1 to highlight the importance of the
temperature dependence. Viscosity decreased with increasing
temperature as could be expected.
Three extruder screws were used throughout the experiments
with a length to diameter ratio of 24:1. These polyolefin screw
designs were selected to provide a comparison of melting condi-
tions with screws typically used in the polymer industry but had
not been specifically designed for this study.
Schematic representations of the screw designs are shown in
Fig. 2, and details are provided below:
(a) 3:1 compression ratio, with gradual compression and % free
volume (FV) ¼ 31.64
(b) 3:1 compression ratio, with rapid compression and % free
volume (FV) ¼ 26.99
(c) 2.5:1 compression ratio, barrier flighted with Maddock mixer
and % free volume (FV) ¼ 36.05
Intrusive Dynamic response References
NO w1 s [6]
YES >1 s [7]
YES w1 s [8,9]
YES w0.1 s [10,12]
NO 10 ms [13e15]
NO w1 ms [16]
NO w0.5 s [17]
 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413
Fig. 1. Shear viscosity of polyethylene measured using off-line capillary rheometer at
180  C, 210  C and 240  C.
Thermal homogeneity was assessed using thermocouple grid and
infra-red techniques. The thermocouple grid sensors used in this
work have been described in detail previously [10] including cali-
bration techniques and quantification of shear heating and conduc-
tion errors. These devices consist of a two dimensional array of
interconnected exposed thermocouple junctions mounted in a sup-
porting frame. Two different wire types were used to construct
thermocouple junctions; at each junction, an EMF is generated
which can be correlated to the local temperature. To create the
Fig. 2. Extruder screw geometries used a) Single flighted, tapered compression. b) Single flighted, stepped compression, c) Barrier flighted with spiral mixer.
407
thermocouple junctions, wires were fused together using a controlled
amount of current discharged from a capacitor. Thermocouple wire
diameter was 0.3 mm. The thermocouple grid was located at the
entrance to a 6 mm diameter rod die, in an instrumented adaptor
section (internal diameter 38 mm) of the single screw extruder (in the
‘die TC grid’ position shown in Fig. 3). The design of the thermocouple
grid incorporated seven junctions located on a central axis across the
flow channel in a non-symmetrical spacing.
Additionally, measurements from a wall thermocouple (3 mm
diameter J-type) and an insulated J-type thermocouple of 0.5 mm
diameter protruding 1.0 mm into the flow were made in the
instrumented adaptor section prior to the die. Melt pressure was
also monitored using a Dynisco PT422A pressure transducer. Melt
temperature in the screw channel close to the end of the extruder
screw was monitored using an infra-red temperature sensor
(Dynisco MTX) flush mounted to the barrel surface. Energy
consumption was monitored using a 3-phase unbalanced loads
energy meter (Hioki 3169) connected to the 3-phase power supply
to the extruder. This measured total energy consumption of the
extrusion process including consumption by the motor, heaters and
cooling fans. Experiments were carried out at a range of extruder
screw speeds from 10 to 90 rpm in steps of 20 rpm, and sufficient
time was allowed for conditions to stabilise at each screw speed. All
measurements were made at a frequency of 10 Hz. Three set
temperature conditions were used as detailed in Table 2.
4. Results and discussion
The performance of each of the three extruder screws in terms
of throughput is compared in Fig. 4, at each set temperature and
screw rotation speed. In single screw extrusion, the feeding section
408 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413
Fig. 3. Instrumented extruder die showing location of thermocouple grid at die entrance.
of the screw is flood fed and the screw channels operate full of
polymer. Therefore, the set screw rotation speed has a direct
influence on the throughput. For both single flighted screws there
was a linear relationship between screw speed and throughput, and
in both cases the set temperature had a negligible effect on
throughput. The barrier flighted screw with spiral mixer was
influenced more by set temperature. At 180  C the throughput from
this screw was lower than the two single flighted screws and dis-
played a non-linear behaviour. The throughput is heavily depen-
dent upon the polymer’s thermal and frictional properties and due
to their design, barrier flighted screws ‘work’ the polymers harder
as the melt is forced to flow over extra flights in the barrier and
mixer sections of the screw. This extra work, required at lower
temperatures appears here to inhibit the total throughput, espe-
cially at higher speeds where achieving melting is more chal-
lenging. At 220  C however, the barrier flighted screw produced
higher throughputs than the single flighted screws. Furthermore,
the barrier flighted screw had a higher free volume than the single
flighted screw which may be able to explain the higher throughput
produced at 220  C, the lower melt viscosity allowing channel
filling more readily. Barrier flighted screws have been shown in
previous studies to provide higher throughputs [18].
Measured die head pressures are displayed in Fig. 5. For single
flighted screws the increase in pressure was relatively linear with
screw speed and was affected significantly by set temperature. Lowest
set temperature caused the highest die pressure due the temperature-
dependent viscosity of the polymer. For the barrier flighted screw,
pressure increase was not linear with screw rotation speed; screw
rotation speed having less effect on pressure at higher speeds. In
contrast to the single flighted screws, set extruder temperature had
a relatively minor effect on die pressure for this screw.
Total energy consumption per unit mass was defined as the
energy output from the energy meter divided by throughput. Both
values, the monitored measurement of energy and the throughput,
were obtained over a period of 1 min.
Total energy consumption per unit massðJ=gÞ
Energy outputðJ=sÞ
¼ :
Throughput ðg=sÞ
Table 2
Extruder set temperatures.
Code Zone 1 Zone 2 Zone 3 Zone 4 Die zones
180  C 130 155 165 180 180  C
200  C 140 170 185 200 200  C
220  C 150 185 205 220 220  C
The total energy consumption for each screw is compared in
Fig. 6. This was found to be heavily dependent upon screw rotation
speed and ranged from 850 to 2600 J/g. This minimum value of
energy consumption required in the process is much higher than
the enthalpy of PE between ambient and process temperatures
(202 J/g) [19], and it is therefore clear that significant process
energy losses occur. At low screw speeds the barrier flighted screw
consumed less energy per unit mass than both of the single flighted
screws, although at higher screw speeds the single flighted screws
compared more favourably. Brinkman numbers [20] were calcu-
lated for each case and showed that conduction was the dominant
form of heat generation within the process at lower throughputs,
up to screw speeds of approximately 50 rpm at 180  C and w70 rpm
at 220  C which could also explain the higher values of energy
consumption observed. Set temperature appeared to have a rela-
tively minor effect on energy consumption especially for the barrier
flighted screw. Higher set extruder temperatures requires a more
significant contribution from the electrical barrel and die heaters
but also causes the polymer melt to have a lower viscosity and
therefore a lower torque requirement for viscous shearing along
the screw channels. These two competing effects appeared here to
be mutually cancelling to a large extent for this particular grade of
polymer.
Melt homogeneity can be assessed by measurement of pressure
and temperature at the extruder die. A typical set of raw data is
shown in Fig. 7 for the tapered compression screw at a set
temperature of 220  C and set screw rotation speeds of 10, 30, 50,
70 and 90 rpm. Melt pressure was found to increase with extruder
screw speed and rapidly reached an equilibrium at each speed. The
wall thermocouple reflected only the temperature of polymer at or
close to the metal wall and maintained at relatively constant levels
except at the highest speed of 90 rpm when it reduced by around
2  C. Temperature measurements made using a junction of the
thermocouple grid and infra-red sensor reflected much higher
deviation in temperature with increasing screw speed, showing
temperature to reach maximum values at a screw speed of 30 rpm.
At high throughputs, single screw extruders have been found to
have limited melting ability, especially those with simpler single
flighted designs. Fig. 7 also shows a high level of variation in melt
temperature at high screw speeds whereas levels of pressure
variation remained relatively constant. The good correlation
between measurements made with the infra-red sensor in the
screw channel and thermocouple grid at the extruder die suggest
that this use of infra-red could be potentially useful for industrial
extrusion applications, and will be explored more fully during our
studies.
 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413 409

Fig. 5. Measured extruder die head pressures from each extruder screw. a) Tapered
Fig. 4. Measured extruder throughputs from each extruder screw. a) Tapered
compression. b) Stepped compression. c) Barrier flighted.
compression. b) Stepped compression. c) Barrier flighted.
410 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413
Fig. 6. Measured energy consumption from each extruder screw. a) Tapered
compression. b) Stepped compression. c) Barrier flighted.
Fig. 7. Comparison of measured raw temperature and pressure data; tapered
compression screw at 220  C (set screw speeds indicated in text boxes).
Radial melt temperature profiles measured using the thermo-
couple grid (averaged over a period of 1 min) are displayed for the
tapered compression and barrier flighted screws at 180  C in Fig. 8.
Data from both screws showed a significant dependence upon set
screw speed. At low speeds of 10 and 30 rpm the temperature profile
generated by each screw was very similar, with the bulk of polymer
in the centre of flow having a temperature of around 195  C, drop-
ping towards the die wall. At higher throughputs the peak
temperature for both screws increased to a maximum of around
212  C, however with the barrier flighted screw melt temperature
was increased across the total flow volume, whereas for the single
flighted screw lower temperature regions were measured towards
the die walls. This is thought to result from the less efficient melting
of single flighted screws, causing the solid bed of polymer in the
screw channel to be fully molten later along the screw length [11].
Melt temperature profiles at low screw speeds were found to be
independent of extruder screw geometry at all set temperatures;
therefore melt temperatures at intermediate (50 rpm) and high
(90 rpm) throughputs are investigated for each screw in more
detail in Figs. 9e11. Set temperature was found to have a direct
effect on measured melt temperature, causing a shift in the profile,
as could be expected.
The difference in melt temperature across the flow volume can
have a direct effect on the quality of the extruded product, influ-
encing dimensions, properties and morphology. At 90 rpm both
single flighted extruder screws (Figs. 9 and 10) were found to display
significant variation across the flow channel, with low temperature
regions close to the die walls evident. Interestingly, this low
temperature dip was more pronounced at higher set temperatures.
The barrier flighted screw achieved much better temperature
homogeneity across the melt channel, with no areas of low
temperature being observed. This confirms the improved melting
ability of the barrier flighted geometry with spiral mixer [21],
which could be assumed to provide improved melt consistency at
the extruder die.
Melt temperature measurements made across the depth of the
screw channel are shown in Fig. 12 for the gradual compression
screw at screw rotation speeds of 10, 50 and 90 rpm at 200  C.
These measurements were obtained by placing the IR sensor flush
mounted to the surface of the extruder barrel close to the extruder
die. Due to the location of the IR sensor, the data are periodic in
nature and are disrupted once per screw rotation by the action of
the extruder flight passing the tip of the IR sensor. Therefore, the
effect of the screw flight in each of the measurements can be
observed either as a periodic dip or peak in temperature.
 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413
Fig. 8. The effect of screw rotation speed on melt averaged melt temperature profile at
a set temperature of 180  C. a) Tapered compression screw. b) Barrier flighted screw.
Fig. 12a shows that at 10 rpm for the gradual compression screw
at 200  C, minimum values were associated with the screw flights
passing the sensor, followed by increased values of temperature
which, reached a maximum value, before decreasing gradually
during the rotation before dropping sharply again at the next screw
flight.
Fig. 9. Measured average melt temperature profiles; tapered compression screw
geometry at 3 set temperatures and screw speeds of 50 and 90 rpm.
411
Fig. 10. Measured average melt temperature profiles; stepped compression screw
geometry at 3 set temperatures and screw speeds of 50 and 90 rpm.
Fig. 12b shows melt temperatures measured by the IR sensor at
a screw speed of 50 rpm. At this screw speed the screw flight
disruption was represented by a sharp peak temperature. These
temperature measurements suggest that the melt temperature was
lower than the temperature of the screw at this condition. At this
screw speed, melt temperatures exhibited higher fluctuations with
significant levels of variation observed between the screw flight
disruptions. These are likely to result from melting instabilities
previously described by the authors with the use of thermocouple
meshes at the same conditions [11].
At 90 rpm, IR melt temperature is displayed in Fig. 12c. Levels of
temperature fluctuation were significantly greater with a variation
of up to 20  C. These results suggest that non-intrusive IR ther-
mometry in the metering section of the extruder screw was
sensitive to melt homogeneity, which depends of the melting
ability of the extruder screw.
In addition to average melt temperature profiles, variation over
time is also important. As already shown in Fig. 7, large temperature
fluctuations can exist which may not be reflected in pressure vari-
ation. In order to compare the performance of the three extruder
screws and three set temperatures, the throughput, energy
consumption, melt pressure variation and melt temperature vari-
ation are plotted in bar chart form in Figs. 13e16 for screw speeds of
Fig. 11. Measured average melt temperature profiles; barrier flighted screw geometry
with spiral mixer at 3 set temperatures and screw speeds of 50 and 90 rpm.
412 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413

Fig. 13. Mass throughput at screw speeds of 50 and 90 rpm.

Fig. 14. Energy consumption at screw speeds of 50 and 90 rpm.

Fig. 12. Measured infra-red melt temperature in the channel of the metering section:
set die temperature 200  C. a) Screw speed at 10 rpm. b) Screw speed at 50 rpm. c)
Screw speed at 90 rpm.

50 and 90 rpm. Fig. 13 shows mass throughput to be of similar

magnitude for all three extruder screws but that the barrier flighted
screw was more affected by set temperature. At 180  C throughput
from this screw was 12% lower than that achieved with the tapered
compression screw. Energy consumption per unit mass (Fig. 14) was
comparable for all three screw geometries and relatively unaffected
by set temperature. Interestingly, energy consumption in the step-
ped compression screw was lowest, corresponding to the poorest
melt temperature homogeneity seen in Fig. 10.
Melt temperature fluctuations (defined as the difference
between maximum and minimum values over a 60 s period) shown
in Fig. 15 were found to be much higher with the two single flighted Fig. 15. Melt temperature variation (thermocouple mesh junction 2) at screw speeds
screws than with the barrier screw. Variations of up to 47  C were of 50 and 90 rpm.
 J. Vera-Sorroche et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 53 (2013) 405e413
Fig. 16. Melt pressure variation at screw speeds of 50 and 90 rpm.
measured, which could have a significant impact on extruded
product quality. The stepped compression screw was shown to
cause the highest level of variation, and fluctuation increased as set
temperature was decreased for both single flighted screws. Fluc-
tuation in the barrier flighted screw at all set temperatures was 6  C
or below. Melt pressure variation, shown in Fig. 16 was significantly
higher with the barrier flighted screw, possibly linked to the spiral
mixer forming part of the metering section. This variation may
adversely effects product quality in some applications.
5. Conclusions
For the grade of high density polyethylene studied, energy
consumption per unit mass was found to be highly dependent
upon throughput but relatively independent of set temperature or
screw geometry. Lowest levels of energy consumption were
measured at the highest extruder throughputs for all screw
geometries studied. Melt temperature homogeneity was shown to
be dependent upon extruder throughput and extruder screw
geometry. Single flighted extruder screws exhibited poorer
temperature homogeneity and larger fluctuations than a barrier
flighted screw with a spiral mixer, although the barrier flighted
screw exhibited higher melt pressure fluctuation. Results of these
studies suggest that to maximise efficiency, single screw extruders
should be operated at the highest possible throughput, whilst the
screw geometry should be carefully chosen to optimise melt
homogeneity. Future work in this project will assess the effect of
different polymer types and extruder scale.
413
Acknowledgements
This work was funded through an inter-disciplinary research
programme (EP/G059330/1) by the Engineering and Physical
Sciences Research Council of the UK. The technical assistance of
Steve Brook, Ken Howell and John Wyborn at the University of
Bradford are gratefully acknowledged.
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