Teflon AF2400/Ultem composite hollow fiber membranes for alcohol dehydration by high-temperature vapor permeation

State-of-the-Art Organic- and Inorganic-Based Hollow Fiber Membranes in Liquid and Gas Applications: Looking Back and Beyond

The aggravation of environmental problems such as water scarcity and air pollution has called upon the need for a sustainable solution globally. Membrane technology, owing to its simplicity, sustainability, and cost-effectiveness, has emerged as one of the favorable technologies for water and air purification. Among all of the membrane configurations, hollow fiber membranes hold promise due to their outstanding packing density and ease of module assembly. Herein, this review systematically outlines the fundamentals of hollow fiber membranes, which comprise the structural analyses and phase inversion mechanism. Furthermore, illustrations of the latest advances in the fabrication of organic, inorganic, and composite hollow fiber membranes are presented. Key findings on the utilization of hollow fiber membranes in microfiltration (MF), nanofiltration (NF), reverse osmosis (RO), forward osmosis (FO), pervaporation, gas and vapor separation, membrane distillation, and membrane contactor are also reported. Moreover, the applications in nuclear waste treatment and biomedical fields such as hemodialysis and drug delivery are emphasized. Subsequently, the emerging R&D areas, precisely on green fabrication and modification techniques as well as sustainable materials for hollow fiber membranes, are highlighted. Last but not least, this review offers invigorating perspectives on the future directions for the design of next-generation hollow fiber membranes for various applications. As such, the comprehensive and critical insights gained in this review are anticipated to provide a new research doorway to stimulate the future development and optimization of hollow fiber membranes.

Review: Membrane Materials for the Removal of Water from Industrial Solvents by Pervaporation and Vapor Permeation

Organic solvents are widely used in a variety of industrial sectors. Reclaiming and reusing the solvents may be the most economically and environmentally beneficial option for managing spent solvents. Purifying the solvents to meet reuse specifications can be challenging. For hydrophilic solvents, water must be removed prior to reuse, yet many hydrophilic solvents form hard-to-separate azeotropic mixtures with water. Such mixtures make separation processes energy intensive and cause economic challenges. The membrane processes pervaporation (PV) and vapor permeation (VP) can be less energy intensive than distillation-based processes and have proven to be very effective in removing water from azeotropic mixtures. In PV/VP, separation is based on the solution-diffusion interaction between the dense permselective layer of the membrane and the solvent/water mixture. This review provides a state-of-the-science analysis of materials used as the selective layer(s) of PV/VP membranes in removing water from organic solvents. A variety of membrane materials, such as polymeric, inorganic, mixed matrix, and hybrid, have been reported in the literature. A small subset of these are commercially available and highlighted here: poly(vinyl alcohol), polyimides, amorphous perfluoro polymers, NaA zeolites, chabazite zeolites, T-type zeolites, and hybrid silicas. The typical performance characteristics and operating limits of these membranes are discussed. Solvents targeted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for reclamation are emphasized and ten common solvents are chosen for analysis: acetonitrile, 1-butanol, N,N-dimethyl formamide, ethanol, methanol, methyl isobutyl ketone, methyl tert-butyl ether, tetrahydrofuran, acetone, and 2-propanol.

Thin Film Composite and/or Thin Film Nanocomposite Hollow Fiber Membrane for Water Treatment, Pervaporation, and Gas/Vapor Separation

Thin film composite (TFC) polymeric hollow fiber (HF) membranes are widely used in industrial gas/vapor separations and water treatment. There are many advantages of TFC HF membranes, such as low energy requirements, simplicity of operation, and high specificity. In the present article, a review is made on the progress that has been achieved during the past 15 years in the preparation of the HF substrate and the preparation/modification of the thin selective layer. The review also includes their applications in water treatment, dehydration of alcohols via pervaporation, and gas/vapor separation.

High-Flux Graphene Oxide Membranes Intercalated by Metal-Organic Framework with Highly Selective Separation of Aqueous Organic Solution

Graphene oxide (GO) membranes assembled by single-atom thick GO nanosheets have displayed huge potential application both in gas and liquid separation processes due to its facile and large-scale preparation resulting from various functional groups, such as hydroxyl, carboxyl, and epoxide groups. Taking advantage of these characters, GO membranes intercalated by superhydrophilic metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as strengthening separation fillers were prepared on modified polyacrylonitrile (PAN) support by a novel pressure-assisted self-assembly (PASA) filtration technique instead of traditional vacuum filtration method for the first time. The synthesized MOF@GO membranes were characterized with several spectroscopic techniques including X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), as well as scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Compared with GO membrane, these MOF@GO membranes combine the unique properties of MOF and GO and thus have significant enhancements of pervaporation (PV) permeation flux and separation factor simultaneously for ethyl acetate/water mixtures (98/2, w/w) through the PV process, which are also superior to the reported other kinds of membranes. Especially, for MOF@GO-0.3 membrane (corresponding MOF loading: 23.08 wt %), the increments are 159% and 244%, respectively, at 303 K, and the permeate water content can reach as high as 99.5 wt % (corresponding separation factor, 9751) with a high permeation flux of 2423 g m^-2 h^-1. Moreover, the procedures of both the synthesis of MOF and membranes preparation are environmentally friendly that only water was used as solvent. Such a nanosized MOF-intercalating approach may be also extended to other laminated membranes, providing valuable insights in designing and developing of advanced membranes for effective separation of aqueous organic solution through nanostructure manipulation of the nanomaterials.