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. 2022 Apr 6;12(4):406.
doi: 10.3390/membranes12040406.

MXene (Ti3C2Tx)/Cellulose Acetate Mixed-Matrix Membrane Enhances Fouling Resistance and Rejection in the Crossflow Filtration Process

Reem S Azam  1 , Dema A Almasri  1 , Radwan Alfahel  2 , Alaa H Hawari  2 , Mohammad K Hassan  3 , Ahmed A Elzatahry  4 , Khaled A Mahmoud  1   3
Affiliations

MXene (Ti3C2Tx)/Cellulose Acetate Mixed-Matrix Membrane Enhances Fouling Resistance and Rejection in the Crossflow Filtration Process

Reem S Azam et al. Membranes (Basel). .

Abstract

Obstacles in the membrane-based separation field are mainly related to membrane fouling. This study involved the synthesis and utilization of covalently crosslinked MXene/cellulose acetate mixed matrix membranes with MXene at different concentrations (CCAM-0% to CCAM-12%) for water purification applications. The membranes' water flux, dye, and protein rejection performances were compared using dead-end (DE) and crossflow (CF) filtration. The fabricated membranes, especially CCAM-10%, exhibited high hydrophilicity, good surface roughness, significantly high water flux, high water uptake, and high porosity. A significantly higher flux was observed in CF filtration relative to DE filtration. Moreover, in CF filtration, the CCAM-10% membrane exhibited 96.60% and 99.49% rejection of methyl green (MG) and bovine serum albumin (BSA), respectively, while maintaining a flux recovery ratio of 67.30% and an irreversible fouling ratio at (Rir) of 32.70, indicating good antifouling performance. Hence, this study suggests that covalent modification of cellulose acetate membranes with MXene significantly improves the performance and fouling resistance of membranes for water filtration in CF mode relative to DE mode.

Keywords: MXene; antifouling; crossflow; membrane filtration.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Crossflow filtration setup.
Figure 2
Figure 2
SEM pictures of the prepared membranes: (a) Surface CCAM-0% showing a dense structure; (b) surface CCAM-2%; (c) surface CCAM-8%; (d) surface CCAM-10% presenting a reduction in pore size after introducing MXene into the CA matrix; (e) cross-section of CCAM-0% displaying a dense structure; (f) cross-section of CCAM-2%; (g) cross-section of CCAM-8%; and (h) CCAM-10% cross-section showing a disordered channel arrangement.
Figure 3
Figure 3
XRD of crosslinked cellulose acetate MXene membranes.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Atomic force microscopy (AFM) 2D and 3D images for (a) CCAM-0% and (b) CCAM-10%.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Effect of the operating pressure (1–2 bar) on the rejection of MG (100 ppm) and BSA (150 ppm) using DE (blue symbol) and CF (red symbol) filtration (CCAM-10%) for 1 h.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Water flux of CCAMs with various MXene contents (0–10%) for 1 h and 1 bar using DE and CF filtration.
Figure 7
Figure 7
(a) Water recovery ratio of CCAM-0%, CCAM-8%, and CCAM-10% after fouling using 500 ppm BSA protein solution using CF filtration; (b) fouling resistance ratios of CCAM-0%, CCAM-8%, and CCAM-10% using CF filtration.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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