Enhanced water flux through ultrafiltration polysulfone membrane via addition-removal of silica nano-particles: Synthesis and characterization

In the present paper, hierarchically structured ultrafiltration polysulfone (PSf) membrane was prepared to explore the effect of addition and subsequent removal of SiO2 nano-particles on the membrane morphology, hydrophilicity, and separation properties. The PSf based membranes namely PSf, PSf/SiO2 and PSf/WSiO2 (i.e. SiO2 nano-particles was acid-washed and removed from PSf/SiO2), were synthesized and characterized by different characterization methods. Pure water flux through the membranes was determined using a filtration unit operating at a continuous dead-end flow mode. The modification enhanced the morphology, hydrophobicity, porosity and transport properties of the modified membranes, although the molecular weight cut-off (MWCO) of the membranes was not changed considerably. In comparison, PSf/WSiO2 membrane exhibited excellent pure water flux (about 4.5 times the flux of PSf, and 17 times the flux of PSf/SiO2), although antifouling property of PSf/SiO2 in separation of bovine serum albumin (BSA) was better than that of PSf and PSf/WSiO2 membranes. The results suggested that the addition/removal of sacrificial solid fillers within/from a membrane matrix may provide a promising strategy to enhance PSf membrane transport property. (c) 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2016, 133, 43556.