Tuning the Surface Structure of Polyamide Membranes Using Porous Carbon Nitride Nanoparticles for High-Performance Seawater Desalination
Type
ArticleKAUST Department
Advanced Membranes and Porous Materials Research CenterBiological and Environmental Sciences and Engineering (BESE) Division
Chemical Engineering
Chemical Engineering Program
Environmental Science and Engineering
Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division
Date
2020-07-24Submitted Date
2020-06-17Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/664396
Metadata
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Enhancing the water flux while maintaining the high salt rejection of existing reverse osmosis membranes remains a considerable challenge. Herein, we report the use of a porous carbon nitride (C3N4) nanoparticle to potentially improve both the water flux and salt rejection of the state-of-the-art polyamide (PA) thin film composite (TFC) membranes. The organic–organic covalent bonds endowed C3N4 with great compatibility with the PA layer, which positively influenced the customization of interfacial polymerization (IP). Benefitting from the positive effects of C3N4, a more hydrophilic, more crumpled thin film nanocomposite (TFN) membrane with a larger surface area, and an increased cross-linking degree of PA layer was achieved. Moreover, the uniform porous structure of the C3N4 embedded in the ”ridge” sections of the PA layer potentially provided additional water channels. All these factors combined provided unprecedented performance for seawater desalination among all the PA-TFC membranes reported thus far. The water permeance of the optimized TFN membrane is 2.1-folds higher than that of the pristine PA-TFC membrane, while the NaCl rejection increased to 99.5% from 98.0%. Our method provided a promising way to improve the performance of the state-of-art PA-TFC membranes in seawater desalination.Citation
Zhou, Z., Li, X., Shinde, D. B., Sheng, G., Lu, D., Li, P., & Lai, Z. (2020). Tuning the Surface Structure of Polyamide Membranes Using Porous Carbon Nitride Nanoparticles for High-Performance Seawater Desalination. Membranes, 10(8), 163. doi:10.3390/membranes10080163Sponsors
This research was funded by King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia, under the competitive research grant URF/1/3435-01.Publisher
MDPI AGJournal
Membranesae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.3390/membranes10080163
Scopus Count
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