Ultrafiltration experiments of polysaccharide macromolecule have been performed in a batch, stirred as well as unstirred membrane cell using a fully retentive membrane over a wide range of operating conditions. A model based on Hermia's approach for constant pressure dead-end filtration laws is proposed to analyze the flux decline behavior during ultrafiltration in a batch cell. Two model parameters, namely complete pore blocking coefficient and cake filtration coefficient are obtained by minimizing the error involved between calculated and experimental flux data. These parameters along with known operating conditions, membrane permeability and physical properties of feed enable one to predict the transient permeate flux decline. The effect of various operating conditions, such as feed solute concentration, stirrer speed and transmembrane pressure on the flux decline is studied. Experimental results show that operating conditions have significant effect on the onset of cake formation as well as on the flux decline behavior. Model predicted results are successfully compared with the experimental data. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.