Solvent Resistant Hydrolyzed Polyacrylonitrile Membranes

Abstract

We have studied the solvent resistance of polyacrylonitrile membranes hydrolyzed by NaOH. The hydrolyzed polyacrylonitrile membranes provide a candidate material for either the selective layer or the supporting layer for the solvent resistant composite membrane. The origin of this solvent resistance is summarized. Polyacrylonitrile (PAN) cation-exchange NF membranes were prepared from ultrafiltration (UF) membranes through a convenient way developed recently by us. Several explanations for the difference of various solvent permeability coefficients of the cation-exchange PAN NF membrane were also suggested. Relatively high permeability was observed for the solvents with a benzene ring structure. Furthermore, products of their viscosities and permeability, , are close to a constant.

Keywords:

• Nanofiltration membrane
• polyacrylonitrile
• pure solvent permeability coefficients
• solvent resistance

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work was supported by The WaterCAMPWS, a Science and Technology Center of Advanced Materials for the Purification of Water with Systems under the National Science Foundation agreement number CTS-0120978. The ATR/FTIR were measured with the help of David Ladner in Professor Timm Strathmann's group at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Notes

Note: Viscosity from ref. (15,16).