• Membrane Journal
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.26-34
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• 1995

In this study, polysulfone was carboxylated(CPSf), as a method of introducing carboxyl group to polymer main chain using direct lithiation reaction. Then, poly(1-alkyl-4-vinylpyridinium iodide-co-divinylbenzene) (MeVpI-DVB) containing pyridinium cation which has an anion selectivity as a fixed carrier was synthesized. And polymer membranes were prepared by mixing CPSf and MeVpI-DVB. Characteristics and permeation of membranes were investigated. As a result of synthesizing CPSf/MeVpI-DVB, blend was formed, not new copolymer. As the content of CPSf amount increasing, thermal stability of membranes was increasing. Ion exchange capacity was 1.0~1.8(meq/g dry mem.) and water content was 0.16~0.26(g $H_2{O}$)/g dry mem.) and fixed ion concentration was 6.4~7.3(meq/g $H_2{O}$) in synthetic membranes. The $Cl^-$ flux showed an increase due to the increase of CPSf content.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.317-324
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• 2014

It is very well known that the conventional polyamide (PA) thin film composite (TFC) reverse osmosis (RO) membranes have excellent permselective properties, but their chlorine tolerance is not good enough. In this study, to improve such chlorine tolerance, microporous membranes containing hydrophilic functional groups such as -COOH were used as a support to prepare PA TFC RO membranes, employing the conventional interfacial polymerization method. Meta-phenylene diamine (MPD) and 2,6-diamine toluene (2,6-DAT) were used as diamine monomers and tri-mesoyl chloride (TMC) as an acid monomer. The membranes prepared were characterized using various instrumental analytical methods and permeation test set-up. The flux obtained from the membranes prepared so was more than $1.0m^3/m^2day$ at 800 psi of operating pressure, while the salt rejection was over 99.0%. The chlorine tolerance of them was also found to be better than that of the membrane prepared by using conventional polysulfone support without hydrophilic functional groups.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.8 no.6
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• pp.945-953
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• 1997

Aromatic polyetherimide membranes were prepared by dry/wet phase inversion method and investigated regarding the pervaporation characteristic of water-alcohol mixtures by using the permselective property of imide group and the structure modification of skin layer of the membrane. The membrane selectivity increased with the reaction time of surface-modification, to some extent, and the density of top layer tends to increases with increasing the reaction time. In the case of dense membrane, the separation factor was 160 and 2000 for 90wt% ethanol mixture and 90wt% isopropanol solution, respectively, which implies that aromatic polyetherimide has a high permselectivity. The temperature dependence of permeation flux seems to follow an Arrhenius type at the temperature range of ($40^{\circ}C-70^{\circ}C$).

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.45 no.6
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• pp.248-256
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• 2012

A Pd-based hydrogen membranes for hydrogen purification and separation need high hydrogen perm-selectivity. The surface roughness of the support is important to coat the pinholes free and thin-film membrane over it. Also, The pinholes drastically decreased the hydrogen perm-selectivity of the Pd-based composite membrane. In order to remove the pinholes, we introduced various surface pre-treatment such as alumina powder packing, nickel electro-plating and micro-polishing pre-treatment. Especially, the micro-polishing pretreatment was very effective in roughness leveling off the surface of the porous nickel support, and it almost completely plugged the pores. Fine Ni particles filled surface pinholes with could form open structure at the interface of Pd alloy coating and Ni support by their diffusion to the membrane and resintering. In this study, a $4{\mu}m$ surface pore-free Pd-Cu-Ni ternary alloy membrane on a porous nickel substrate was successfully prepared by micro-polishing, high temperature sputtering and Cu-reflow process. And $H_2$ permeation and $N_2$ leak tests showed that the Pd-Cu-Ni ternary alloy hydrogen membrane achieved both high permeability of $13.2ml{\cdot}cm^{-2}{\cdot}min^{-1}{\cdot}atm^{-1}$ permation flux and infinite selectivity.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.211-220
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• 2018

Incorporating nano-materials in thin-film composite (TFC) membranes has been considered to be an approach to achieve higher membrane performance in various water treatment processes. This study investigated the rejection efficiency of three target compounds, i.e., reserpine, norfloxacin and tetracycline hydrochloride, by TFC membranes with different graphene oxide proportions. Graphene oxide (GO) was incorporated into the polyamide active layer of a TFC membrane via an interfacial polymerization (IP) reaction. The TFC membranes were characterized with FTIR, FE-SEM, AFM; in addition, the water contact angle measurements as well as the permeation and separation performance were evaluated. The prepared GO-TFC membranes exhibited a much higher flux ($3.11{\pm}0.04L/m2{\cdot}h{\cdot}bar$) than the pristine TFC membranes ($2.12{\pm}0.05L/m2{\cdot}h{\cdot}bar$) without sacrificing their foulant rejection abilities. At the same time, the GO-modified membrane appeared to be less sensitive to pH changes than the pure TFC membrane. A significant improvement in the anti-fouling property of the membrane was observed, which was ascribed to the favorable change in the membrane's hydrophilicity, surface morphology and surface charge through the addition of an appropriate amount of GO. This study predominantly improved the understanding of the different PA/GO membranes and outlined improved industrial applications of such membranes in the future.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.333-340
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• 2009

This paper is designed with the purpose of improving the efficiency of the sulfonic acid ion exchange membranes by radiation induced graft polymerization. It has been shown that the porous hollow fiber membranes could cause permeability blocking between pores and ion exchanged graft chains. Addition of crosslinker such as N-ethylene glycol dimethacrylate will permit to increase the permeation flux. In this research, the ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EDMA) and diethylene glycol dimethacrylate (DDMA) with different length are used as crosslinkers. The ion exchanged cross-linked membrane (EDMA, DDMA) containing sulfonic acid group by radiation induced grafted polymerization are sn died for adsorb metal ions (Pb). It has been shown that adsorbed metal ions ($Pb^{2+}$) for the EDMA and DDMA membranes with the density of sulfonic acid groups, 1.40 mmol/g and 2.14 mmol/g, respectively are 13.82 mg/g, 17.37 mg/g, accordingly.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.297-316
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• 2010

Membrane fouling is one of the major operational concerns of membrane processes which results in loss of productivity. This paper investigates the ultrafiltration (UF) results of synthetic oil-in-water (o/w) emulsion using flat sheets of polysulfone (PSf) membrane synthesized with four different compositions. The aim is to identify the mechanisms responsible for the observed permeate flux reduction with time for different PSf membranes. The experiments were carried out at four transmembrane pressures i.e., 68.9 kPa, 103.4 kPa, 137.9 kPa and 172.4 kPa. Three initial oil concentrations i.e., 75 $mgL^{-1}$, 100 $mgL^{-1}$ and 200 $mgL^{-1}$ were considered. The resistance-in-series (RIS) model was applied to interpret the data and on that basis, the individual resistances were evaluated. The significances of these resistances were studied in relation to parameters, namely, transmembrane pressure and initial oil concentration. The total resistance to permeate flow is found to increase with increase in both transmembrane pressure and initial oil concentration while for higher oil concentration, resistance due to concentration polarization is found to be the prevailing resistance. The applicability of the constant pressure filtration models to the experimental data was also tested to explain the blocking process. The study shows that intermediate pore blocking is the dominant mechanism at the initial period of UF while in the later period, the fouling process is found to approach cake filtration like mechanism. However, the duration of pore blocking mechanism is different for different membranes depending on their morphological and permeation properties.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.287-298
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• 2019

Lotus leaf has a special dual micro and nano surface structure which gives its highly hydrophobic surface characteristics and so-called self cleaning effect. In order to endow PVDF hollow fiber membrane with this special structure and improve the hydrophobicity of membrane surface, PVDF hollow fiber composite membranes was obtained through the immersion coating of poly(vinylidene fluoride-co-hexafluoropropylene) (PVDF-HFP) dilute solution on the outside surface of PVDF support membrane. The prepared PVDF composite membranes were used in the vacuum membrane distillation (VMD) for the desalination. The effects of PVDF-HFP dilute solution concentration in the dope solution and coating time on VMD separation performance was studied. Membranes were characterized by SEM, WCA measurement, porosity, and liquid entry pressure of water. VMD test was carried out using $35g{\cdot}L^{-1}$ NaCl aqueous solution as the feed solution at feed temperature of $30^{\circ}C$ and the permeate pressure of 31.3 kPa. The vapour flux reached a maximum when PVDF-HFP concentration in the dilute solution was 5 wt% and the coating time was kept in the range of 10-60 s. This was attributed to the well configuration of micro-nano rods which was similar with the dual micro-nano structure on the lotus leaf. Compared with the original PVDF membrane, the salt rejection can be well maintained which was greater than 99.99 % meanwhile permeation water conductivity was kept at a low value of $7-9{\mu}S{\cdot}cm^{-1}$ during the continuous testing for 360 h.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.12 no.10
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• pp.51-56
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• 2011

This study was conducted to investigate the applicability of pulsed electric field (PEF) treatment for the prevention of scaling formation and membrane fouling reduction. To validate the effect of PEF and to identify the mechanism, some experiments with and without PEF treatment were carried out. PEF treatment affected the precipitation of $CaCO_3$ by which $CaCO_3$ particles were actively grown and sedimented. It was confirmed that the calcium ions were decreased as 78% and particle size was grown by PEF treatment. It was also verified that the crystalline structure of $CaCO_3$ was transformed by PEF treatment from Aragonite, which is formed at a high temperature and hard to be removed, to Calcite being stable at room temperature. In PEF treatment, permeate volume and permeation flux were greater than that of without PEF, case while Langelier Index(LI) decreased. From the experiment results, PEF treatment is believed to be an effective method to prevent scaling formation and to mitigate $CaCO_3$ fouling as the pretreatment of membrane filtration.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.15 no.7
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• pp.4665-4674
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• 2014

The aim of this study was to confirm the feasibility of the electro-coagulation process as a pre-treatment for the membrane separation of anaerobic digestion effluents to minimize membrane fouling. The reduction of membrane fouling was evaluated according to the number of electrodes (immersed surface area of electrodes), current density and contact time. In the case of the small surface area of electrodes, the increased electric field strength resulted in a soluble COD increase due to the destruction of the microbial flocs and/or cells, whereas large changes in the soluble COD were not observed in the case of the high surface area of electrodes. On the other hand, the T-P concentration decreased as a result of the precipitation of aluminum ions and phosphates. The membrane permeation flux increased and the fouling resistance (Rc+Rf) decreased with increasing electric current density. Although the particle size of the anaerobic digestion effluent increased slightly, it was not related directly to the reduced fouling phenomena. The main mechanism for the enhanced flux was attributed to the inorganic particulate produced during electrocoagulation, such as $AlPO_4$, which acted as a dynamic membrane deposited on the membrane surface.