Water Transport through Ultrathin Polyamide Nanofilms Used for Reverse Osmosis

Advanced Materials
Zhiwei JiangAndrew G Livingston

Abstract

Thin-film composite membranes comprising a polyamide nanofilm separating layer on a support material are state of the art for desalination by reverse osmosis. Nanofilm thickness is thought to determine the rate of water transport through the membranes; although due to the fast and relatively uncontrolled interfacial polymerization reaction employed to form these nanofilms, they are typically crumpled and the separating layer is reported to be ≈50-200 nm thick. This crumpled structure has confounded exploration of the independent effects of thickness, permeation mechanism, and the support material. Herein, smooth sub-8 nm polyamide nanofilms are fabricated at a free aqueous-organic interface, exhibiting chemical homogeneity at both aqueous and organic facing surfaces. Transfer of these ultrathin nanofilms onto porous supports provides fast water transport through the resulting nanofilm composite membranes. Manipulating the intrinsic nanofilm thickness from ≈15 down to 8 nm reveals that water permeance increases proportionally with the thickness decrease, after which it increases nonlinearly to 2.7 L m-2 h-1 bar-1 as the thickness is further reduced to ≈6 nm.

References

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Citations

Jun 11, 2019·Chemical Society Reviews·Chao ZhangZhi-Kang Xu
Sep 15, 2019·Nature Communications·Xinda YouZhongyi Jiang
May 2, 2020·ChemSusChem·Jine WuXianfeng Li
Dec 10, 2019·Chemistry, an Asian Journal·Junjun HouZhiyong Tang
Dec 2, 2020·Nature Communications·Bingbing YuanQ Jason Niu
Jan 2, 2021·Science·Geoffrey M Geise
Feb 13, 2021·ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces·Zhi GengYang Huo
Dec 29, 2020·Environmental Technology·Ashish R Kavaiya, Hiren D Raval
Nov 20, 2020·Nature Communications·Tiefan HuangSuzana P Nunes
Nov 14, 2020·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Cody L RittMenachem Elimelech
Apr 27, 2021·Langmuir : the ACS Journal of Surfaces and Colloids·Yuya IshizakiMasaya Mitsuishi
May 29, 2021·Langmuir : the ACS Journal of Surfaces and Colloids·Peter Ozaveshe OvirohSina Karimzadeh
Jun 8, 2021·Journal of Membrane Science·William D MulhearnChristopher M Stafford
Mar 28, 2020·Environmental Science & Technology·Chuning ShangSui Zhang
Apr 23, 2019·ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces·Xiaoli WuPeng Zhang
Sep 9, 2021·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Yang LuJian Jin

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