Citation: Jianwen Zhao, Shuai Wang, Shanshan Zhao, Liwei Chen, Fangang Meng, Xuelin Tian. A non-fluorinated liquid-like membrane with excellent anti-scaling performance for membrane distillation[J]. Chinese Chemical Letters, ;2025, 36(1): 109883. doi: 10.1016/j.cclet.2024.109883 shu

A non-fluorinated liquid-like membrane with excellent anti-scaling performance for membrane distillation

Jianwen Zhao ^{a, b} ,
Shuai Wang ^{a, b} ,
Shanshan Zhao ^{c, *,} ,
Liwei Chen ^{a, b, *,} ,
Fangang Meng ^c ,
Xuelin Tian ^{a, b, *,}

a.
State Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Technologies, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China
b.
Key Laboratory for Polymeric Composite & Functional Materials of Ministry of Education, Guangzhou Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronic Materials and Wearable Devices, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China
c.
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Environmental Pollution Control and Remediation Technology, School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China

Received Date: 27 January 2024
Revised Date: 2 April 2024
Accepted Date: 10 April 2024
Available Online: 11 April 2024

Figures(6)

Membrane distillation (MD) has gained extensive attention for treating highly saline wastewater. However, membrane scaling during the MD process has hindered the rapid development of this technology. Current approaches to mitigate scaling in membrane distillation focus primarily on achieving enhanced hydrophobicity and even superhydrophobicity via utilizing fluorinated fibrous membrane or introducing perfluorosilane modification. Considering the environmental hazards posed by fluorinated compounds, it is highly desirable to develop non-fluorinated membranes with enhanced anti-scaling properties for effective membrane distillation. In this study, we present a non-fluorinated liquid-like MD membrane with exceptional anti-scaling performance. This membrane was facilely fabricated by grafting linear polydimethylsiloxane (LPDMS) onto a hydrophilic polyether sulfone (PES) membrane pre-coated with the intermediate layers of polydopamine and silica (denoted as LPDMS-PES). Remarkably, LPDMS-PES manifested a drastically improved scaling resistance in continuous MD tests than its perfluorinated counterpart, i.e., 1H,1H,2H,2H-perfluorooctyltrichlorosilane-modified PES membrane (PFOS-PES), in both heterogeneous nucleation-dominated and crystal deposition-dominated scaling processes, despite the latter having a smaller surface energy. LPDMS-PES demonstrated a reduction of crystal accumulation of approximately 85% for NaCl and 73% for CaSO₄ in the heterogeneous nucleation-dominated scaling process compared to PFOS-PES. Additionally, in the crystal deposition-dominated scaling process LPDMS-PES exhibited a reduction of about 70% in scale accumulation. These results explicitly evidenced the great potential of the liquid-like membrane to minimize scaling in membrane distillation by inhibiting both scale nucleation and adhesion onto the membrane. We believe the findings of this study have important implications for the design of high-performance MD membranes, particularly in the quest for environmentally sustainable alternatives to perfluorinated materials.
- Surface modification,
- Liquid-like membranes,
- Anti-scaling,
- Non-fluorinated,
- Direct contact membrane distillation
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