TY - JOUR
T1 - New RO TFC membranes by interfacial polymerization in n-Dodecane with various co-solvents
AU - Al-Hobaib, Abdullah Sulaiman
AU - Al-Suhybani, Mohammed Sulaiman
AU - Al-Sheetan, Khalid Mohammed
AU - Mousa, Hasan
AU - Shaik, Mohammed Rafi
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
PY - 2016/6
Y1 - 2016/6
N2 - The objective of this research is to prepare and characterize a new and highly efficient polyamide TFC RO membrane by interfacial polymerization in dodecane solvent mixed with co-solvents. Three co-solvents were tested namely; acetone, ethyl acetate, and diethyl ether of concentration of 0.5, 1, 2, 3, and 5 wt. The modified membranes were characterized by SEM, EDX, AFM and contact angle techniques. The results showed that addition of co-solvent results in a decrease in the roughness, pore size and thickness of the produced membranes. However, as the concentration of the co-solvent increases the pore size of the membranes gets larger. Among the three co-solvents tested, acetone was found to result in membranes with the largest pore size and contact angle followed by diethyl ether then ethyl acetate. Measured contact angle increases as the concentration of the co-solvent increases reaching a constant value except for ethyl acetate where it was found to drop. Investigating flux and salt rejection by the formulated membranes showed that higher flux was attained when acetone was used as a co-solvent followed by diethyl ether then ethyl acetate. However, the highest salt rejection was achieved with diethyl ether.
AB - The objective of this research is to prepare and characterize a new and highly efficient polyamide TFC RO membrane by interfacial polymerization in dodecane solvent mixed with co-solvents. Three co-solvents were tested namely; acetone, ethyl acetate, and diethyl ether of concentration of 0.5, 1, 2, 3, and 5 wt. The modified membranes were characterized by SEM, EDX, AFM and contact angle techniques. The results showed that addition of co-solvent results in a decrease in the roughness, pore size and thickness of the produced membranes. However, as the concentration of the co-solvent increases the pore size of the membranes gets larger. Among the three co-solvents tested, acetone was found to result in membranes with the largest pore size and contact angle followed by diethyl ether then ethyl acetate. Measured contact angle increases as the concentration of the co-solvent increases reaching a constant value except for ethyl acetate where it was found to drop. Investigating flux and salt rejection by the formulated membranes showed that higher flux was attained when acetone was used as a co-solvent followed by diethyl ether then ethyl acetate. However, the highest salt rejection was achieved with diethyl ether.
KW - Co-solvent
KW - Desalination
KW - Interfacial polymerization
KW - RO membrane
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U2 - 10.3390/membranes6020024
DO - 10.3390/membranes6020024
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84973370221
SN - 2077-0375
VL - 6
JO - Membranes
JF - Membranes
IS - 2
M1 - 24
ER -