TY - JOUR
T1 - A facile and scalable fabrication method for thin film composite reverse osmosis membranes
T2 - dual-layer slot coating
AU - Park, Sung Joon
AU - Ahn, Won Gi
AU - Choi, Wansuk
AU - Park, Sang Hee
AU - Lee, Jong Suk
AU - Jung, Hyun Wook
AU - Lee, Jung-hyun
PY - 2017
Y1 - 2017
N2 - We report on a unique, facile and scalable fabrication technique, dual-layer slot coating (DSC) for high performance polyamide (PA) thin film composite (TFC) reverse osmosis (RO) membranes. DSC allows the simultaneous and continuous spreading of two reactive monomer solutions to create an unsupported PA layer via in situ polymerization, which is then adhered onto a porous support to form a membrane. DSC facilitates the characterization of the PA layer structure by easily isolating it. The DSC-assembled PA layer exhibits a thinner and smoother structure with a more wettable and less negatively charged surface than the one prepared via conventional interfacial polymerization (IP), which was attributed to the uniformly expedited amine (MPD) diffusion at the bulk liquid interface during film formation. As a result, DSC enables the formation of an extremely thin (∼9 nm) and dense PA layer using a very low MPD concentration, which is not feasible by conventional IP. Importantly, the DSC-assembled membrane shows an excellent water flux and NaCl rejection, exceeding both IP control and commercial RO membranes. The DSC technique will open a new paradigm for the fabrication of TFC membranes with strong commercial potential due to its simplicity, scalability and high performance.
AB - We report on a unique, facile and scalable fabrication technique, dual-layer slot coating (DSC) for high performance polyamide (PA) thin film composite (TFC) reverse osmosis (RO) membranes. DSC allows the simultaneous and continuous spreading of two reactive monomer solutions to create an unsupported PA layer via in situ polymerization, which is then adhered onto a porous support to form a membrane. DSC facilitates the characterization of the PA layer structure by easily isolating it. The DSC-assembled PA layer exhibits a thinner and smoother structure with a more wettable and less negatively charged surface than the one prepared via conventional interfacial polymerization (IP), which was attributed to the uniformly expedited amine (MPD) diffusion at the bulk liquid interface during film formation. As a result, DSC enables the formation of an extremely thin (∼9 nm) and dense PA layer using a very low MPD concentration, which is not feasible by conventional IP. Importantly, the DSC-assembled membrane shows an excellent water flux and NaCl rejection, exceeding both IP control and commercial RO membranes. The DSC technique will open a new paradigm for the fabrication of TFC membranes with strong commercial potential due to its simplicity, scalability and high performance.
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U2 - 10.1039/c7ta00891k
DO - 10.1039/c7ta00891k
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85017138698
VL - 5
SP - 6648
EP - 6655
JO - Journal of Materials Chemistry A
JF - Journal of Materials Chemistry A
SN - 2050-7488
IS - 14
ER -
