4.3 Article

Polymeric membranes conditioning for sensors applications: mechanism and influence on analytes detection

Journal

JOURNAL OF SOLID STATE ELECTROCHEMISTRY
Volume 16, Issue 3, Pages 901-909

Publisher

SPRINGER
DOI: 10.1007/s10008-011-1456-y

Keywords

Polymeric membranes; Electromembranes conditioning; Ion-selective electrodes; Morphological analysis; Amorphous materials

Funding

  1. CSGI

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In this work, we studied an ion-exchange membrane based on an inert polymer skeleton in which it is dispersed and anchored a molecule with charged groups able to discriminate and bind positive or negatively charged ions present in a sample. In order to be ready to work, electromembranes need a complex procedure called activation or conditioning. Although most of the known literature looks at the subject from an electrochemical point of view, we put forward a structural approach. Membrane conditioning, in fact, is considered a required step to improve sensor performances and to allow the collection of reproducible data. Even if this operation is carefully followed by all the operators working with sensors equipped with a membrane, it looks like that a thoroughly explanation of the working mechanism and a detailed balance of cost and gains has still not been carried out. As a consequence, we suggest a bulk or membrane approach, where the landscape is mainly characterized by the long-range structure of the membrane itself. Our findings suggest that membrane conditioning has to be carried out carefully and the advantages of this pre-treatment can be appreciated especially for very low concentration measurements. The need for the conditioning mainly results from the necessity of a complete permeation of all the different tortuous channels constituting the membrane itself.

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