Contact
    Start Publications Vacuum-assisted MPD loading toward promoted nanoscale structure ...
    ←  Publication Finder
    Attension

    Vacuum-assisted MPD loading toward promoted nanoscale structure and enhanced water permeance of polyamide RO membrane

    Year: 2022

    Journal: Sep. Purif. Technol., Volume 297, SEP 15

    Authors: Wu, Siqi; Wang, Fei; Zhou, Shenghua; Long, Li; Yang, Zhe; Tang, Chuyang Y.

    Organizations: Senior Research Fellow Scheme of Research Grants Council [SRFS2021-7S04]; Seed Grant for Basic Research of the University of Hong Kong [104006094]

    Keywords: Thin-film composite membrane; Desalination; Interfacial polymerization; Reverse osmosis; Vacuum-assisted interfacial polymerization

    Thin-film composite (TFC) reverse osmosis (RO) membranes fabricated by interfacial polymerization (IP) have been widely applied in seawater desalination. Nevertheless, their separation performance is limited by the permeance-selectivity upper bound. Compared to conventional synthesis/modification techniques, the manipulation of amine monomer distribution for the IP reaction has been far less investigated. In this study, we systematically investigated three classical approaches for m-phenylenediamine (MPD) loading during the IP reaction, i.e., vacuum filtration (TFC-V), roller (TFC-R), and air gun (TFC-A). Our results suggested that the vacuum-assisted approach can greatly enhance the availability of MPD monomers, which could, in turn, result in enhanced ridge-and-valley morphology of the polyamide rejection layer as a result of the enhanced nanofoaming effect. Furthermore, the TFC-V membrane demonstrated the highest water permeance of 2.8 +/- 0.4 L m-2 h-1 bar-1 compared to TFC-R and TFC-A membranes of 2.1 +/- 0.2 L m-2 h-1 bar-1 and 2.1 +/- 0.4 L m-2 h-1 bar-1, respectively. This study provided mechanistic insights to facilitate an improved understanding of membrane synthesis-structure-performance relationships.
    View publication