Direct interfacial polymerization onto thin ceramic hollow fibers

Abstract

Membrane separation under harsh conditions, such as high-p,T or in the presence of aggressive chemicals, requires a robust membrane support. In academia commonly ceramic disks are used for this purpose, but these disks posses a too low surface-area-to-volume ratio for practical applications. Ceramic hollow fibers potentially provide a much larger specific surface area, but applying a defect free thin selective layer on such structures is more intricate. Here we show the successful preparation of a thin polyamide layer on a thin porous hollow α-alumina fiber by interfacial polymerization of piperazine with trimesoyl chloride. Two aspects of the fabrication method are identified as particularly crucial for obtaining a high quality selective layer: i) the layer the ceramic surface should have a sufficient amount of hydroxyl groups for covalent attachment in order to avoid delamination, and ii) controlled drying steps are necessary to avoid local surplus or lack of liquid on the outer surface of the ceramic. To increase the hydroxyl group concentration, and to facilitate the presence of sufficient reactants in a large volume of small pores, the fibers have been coated with a layer of γ-alumina. Sufficiently long drying steps (20 mm) have been employed to avoid uneven drying over the length of the fiber. The obtained fibers show clean water fluxes in the range of 2-5 L m −2 h −1 bar −1 combined with a retention of Rose Bengal above 99%.

Facile manufacture of porous organic framework membranes for precombustion CO 2 capture

“…α-Al 2 O 3 was selected because of its good thermal stability. Moreover, the γ-Al 2 O 3 layer offers a large volume of small hydrophilic pores, ideal for the IP process ( 26 ). In a typical preparation procedure, membranes were synthesized by immersing an α-Al 2 O 3 disk in a 1.5 weight % (wt %) 1,2,4,5-benzenetetramine tetrahydrochloride (BTA) aqueous solution for 20 min.…”

New Method toward a Robust Covalently Attached Cross-Linked Nanofiltration Membrane

“…In addition, ceramic supports can be easily functionalized with a wide range of small organic molecules 23 including thiol-terminated ones. 24 Even though IP layers have been successfully formed on ceramic supports in the past, 25 only conventional IP (polyamides predominantly) procedures were used, and to date no covalent attachment between the selective layer and the ceramic support has been reported. In this work, the second “click” reaction is done via a vapor phase interfactial polymerization (VIP) without the use of a catalyst.…”

Morphology and Physical Properties of Ceramic Hollow Fibre Membrane: Effect of Different Bore Fluid Flow Rates

“…Ceramic hollow fibre membranes (CHFMs) are a type of synthetic membrane comprising of a semi-permeable barrier in the form of hollow fibre. The CHFM is preferable given its practical application including high surface area per unit volume, small diameters of fibres (~ 200 μm), better flow profile and in accordance with the design of existing reactor structure (Maaskant et al 2018;Zhu et al 2015). Most commercial CHFMs are packed into cartridges which can be used for different types of liquid and gaseous separations.…”

“…Most commercial CHFMs are packed into cartridges which can be used for different types of liquid and gaseous separations. Typically, the CHFM is fabricated by using metal oxide such as silica (SiO 2 ) (Bao-li et al 2018), alumina (Al 2 O 3 ) (Maaskant et al 2018), zirconia (ZrO 2 ) (Yu et al 2015) and titania (TiO 2 ) (Chakraborty et al 2017). Among these materials, SiO 2 is widely used as CHFMs (Chen et al 2012;Jiang et al 2017;Kai-Fan et al 2018;Zhang et al 2018).…”