• Membrane Journal
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.212-219
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• 2016

The alumina hollow fiber membranes were prepared by spinning and sintering a polymer solution containing suspended alumina powders. For determine pore structure of hollow fiber membranes formed by different solvent-nonsolvent interaction rate, dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO), dimethylacetamide (DMAc), triethylphosphite (TEP) were prepared in dope solution by solvent, polyethersulfone (PESf) and polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) were used as a polymer binder and additive. The pore structure of hollow fiber membranes was characterized using scanning electron microscope (SEM). The alumina hollow fiber membranes prepared by DMSO, DMAc were had the asymmetric structure mixed sponge-like and finger-like morphology, while TEP solvent were had single sponge-like structure. The prepared hollow fiber membranes were analyzed gas permeation and mechanical strength experiment also. The hollow fiber membrane having single sponge-like structure was had high gas permeation performance. On the contrary to this, more finger-like morphology was less gas permeation performance.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.312-319
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• 2010

Carbon membrane materials have received considerable attention for the gas separation including hydrocarbon mixture of ingredients of the volatile organic compounds(VOCs) because they possess their higher selectivity, permeability, and thermal stability than the polymeric membranes. The use of activated carbon membranes makes it possible to separate continuously the VOCs mixture by the selective adsorption-diffusion mechanism which the condensable components are preferentially adsorbed in to the micropores of the membrane. The activated carbon hollow fiber membranes with uniform adsorptive micropores on the wall of open pores and the surface of the membranes have been fabricated by the carbonization of a thin film of phenolic resin deposited on porous alumina hollow fiber membrane. Oxidation, carbonization, and activation processing variables were controlled under different conditions in order to improve the separation characteristics of the activated carbon membrane. Properties of activated carbon hollow fiber membranes and the characterization of a gas permeation by pyrolysis conditions were studied. As the result, the activated carbon hollow fiber membranes with good separation capabilities by the molecular size mechanism as well as selective adsorption on the pores surface followed by surface diffusion effective in the recovery hydrocarbons have been obtained. Therefore, these activated carbon membranes prepared in this study are shown as promising candidate membrane for separation of VOCs.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.59 no.2
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• pp.174-179
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• 2021

Recently, hybrid coal research is underway to upgrade low-grade coal. The hybrid coal is made by mixing low-grade coal with bioliquids such as molasses, sugar cane, and lignin. In the case of lignin used here, a large amount of lignin is included in the wastewater of the papermaking process, and thus, research on hybrid coal production using the same is attracting attention. However, since a large amount of metal ions are contained in the lignin wastewater from the papermaking process, substances that corrode the generator are generated during combustion, and the amount of fly ash is increased. To solve this problem, it is essential to remove metal ions in the lignin wastewater. In this study, metal ions were removed by ion exchange with a alumina hollow fiber membrane coated with K-Phillipsite (K-PHI) zeolite. The alumina hollow fiber membrane used as the support was prepared by the nonsolvent induced phase separation (NIPS) method, and K-PHI seeds were prepared by hydrothermal synthesis. The prepared K-PHI seed was seeded on the surface of the support and coated by secondary growth hydrothermal synthesis. The characteristic of prepared coating membrane was analyzed by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDX), and the concentration of metal ions before and after ion exchange was measured by Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectrometer (ICP-OES). The extraction amount of K+ is 86 mg/kg, and the extraction amount of Na+ is 54.9 mg/kg. Therefore, K-PHI zeolite membrane has the potential to remove potassium and sodium ions from the solution and can be used in acidic lignin wastewater.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.150-162
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• 2022

In the field of water treatment and pharmaceutical bio an alumina hollow fiber membrane used for mixture separation. However, due to the lack of strengths it is very brittle to handle and apply. Therefore, it is necessary to study and improve the bending strength of the membrane to 100 MPa or more. In this study, as the mixing ratio of the nano-particles increased to 0, 1, 3, and 5 wt%, the viscosity of the fluid mixture increased. The pore structure of the hollow membrane produced by interrupting the diffusion exchange rate of the solvent and non-solvent during the spinning process suppresses the formation of the finger-like structure and gradually increases the ratio of the sponge-like structure to improve the membrane mechanical strength to more than 100 MPa. As a result, an interparticle space was ensured to improve the porosity of the sponge-like structure with high permeability, and it showed excellent N2 permeability of about 100000 GPU and high water permeability of 3000 L/m² h. Therefore, it can be concluded, that the addition of γ-Al₂O₃ nanoparticles as sintering aid is an important method to enhance the mechanical strength of the α-alumina hollow fiber membrane to maintain high permeability.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.21-30
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• 2018

In this study, homogeneous and defect-free ceramic ultrafiltration membranes were fabricated by using the sol-gel method. A boehmite sol was synthesized and coated onto the surface of alumina hollow fiber microfiltration membranes. The effect of sol viscosity and surface tension on the coating layer homogeneity and thickness was investigated. The optimum coating repetition using pristine sol was determined to be 3 times, as the samples coated more than 4 times showed delamination. Fixing the coating repetition to 3 times, the effect of sintering temperature was also studied in this work. The samples sintered at $1000^{\circ}C$ exhibited the highest pure water permeability with the molecular weight cut-off (MWCO) of approximately 51 kDa (10 nm dextran), and the samples sintered at 600, $800^{\circ}C$ displayed the MWCO of 12 kDa (5 nm dextran). The ultrafiltration membranes prepared in this work showed competitive performance compared to the reported ceramic ultrafiltration membranes.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.369-376
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• 2023

In this study, the alternative to the energy-intensive conventional vacuum distillation process, an eco-friendly and energy-efficient pervaporation separation was employed in 1,2 hexane diol/water (HDO/water) mixture. The crosslinked PVA-glutaraldehyde was coated inside the alumina hollow fiber membrane (Al-HF). In the HDO/IPA pervaporation separation, optimization of the membrane concerning PVA/GA ratio, curing temperature, and pervaporation operating condition were performed. In the long-term stability test, the sustainable pervaporation separation performance giving flux in the range of 1.90~2.16 kg/m²h, and water content in permeate was higher than 99.5% (separation factor = 68) was obtained from the PVA/GA (molar ratio = 0.08, curing temperature = 80℃) coated Al-HF membrane from HDO/water (25/75, w/w, %) mixture at 40℃. Therefore, this work provides potential and inspiration for PVA-based membranes to mitigate excessive energy requirements in HDO/water separation by pervaporation.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.263-272
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• 2017

There are several different methods to characterize membrane pore size distribution, however, it is yet difficult to accurately measure pore size range of 10-50 nm. In this work, we employed gas-liquid displacement porometer (GLDP) and liquid-liquid displacement porometer (LLDP) to characterize in-house alumina hollow fiber membrane (K-100) and commercial membranes (A-100, A-20) that exhibit pore sizes between 10-100 nm. GLDP method was more suitable for measuring the maximum pore size, and the measured mean pore size of the membranes by LLDP were better correlated with water permeability and solute rejection. It was determined that LLDP is effective for measuring pore sizes between 10-50 nm; however, the method holds intrinsic disadvantages such as low precision and high sensitivity compared to that of GLDP. Nevertheless, it is expected that the recently commercialized LLDP technique can provide useful data that other methods cannot.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.439-446
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• 2023

Ceramic membranes are generally used for various industrial processes operating under extreme conditions because of its high thermal and chemical stability. However, due to the trade-off phenomenon of permeability and mechanical strength, preparation of high permeability-high strength membrane is necessary. In this study, the change in characteristics and performances of ceramic membranes was analyzed depending on the type of polymer binder and its mixing ratio. Because the solubility between solvent and polymer binder was higher in PSf (polysulfone) than in PES (polyethersulfone), the viscosity and discharge pressure of the PSf-based dope solution were higher than those of PES-based dope solution. When PSf was used as a polymer binder, ceramic membrane showed high mechanical strength and low water permeability due to the dense structure. On the other hand, in case of PES, the mechanical strength was slightly reduced and the water permeability was increased. It was confirmed that the optimum mixing ratio of the PSf and PES with high water permeability and mechanical strength was 9:1.