Synthesis and characterization of a spun membrane with modified Al2O3

In this work, composite nanofiber membranes were prepared by adding modified nano-sized Al2O3-particles to a polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) solution (17 wt %) through an electrospinning process. The Al2O3 content affected the spun membrane performance, such as hydrophilicity, bovine serum albumin (BSA) rejection rate and anti-fouling properties were examined in detail. UF (experiment with an ultrafiltration cup) experiment was used to measure how the membrane water flux changed. This test showed that the nanoparticle affect was remarkable, the pure water flux was 4635 L•m−2•h−1 in 2% Al2O3/PVDF membrane versus 3546 L•m−2•h−1 for the membrane without nanoparticles. Contact angle was used to determine the hydrophilicity change of membranes. The results demonstrate that the modified membrane hydrophilicity was enhanced dramatically the contact angle of composite membrane with 2% Al2O3 was 56.34° versus 85.64° for the pristine PVDF membrane. The roughness and surface structure were measured by atomic force microscope (AFM) and electron microscopy (SEM). There were clear fibers in SEM images and the membrane surface roughness was heightened by adding nanoparticles. The rejection rate was investigated by UV spectrophotometer and the porosity was measured using a dry-wet weight method. The spun membrane rejection rate was 95.4%. Thermo gravimetric Analysis (TGA) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) were used to study how nano-Al2O3 particles affected the membrane structure. More importantly, the Al2O3/PVDF spun membrane displayed an outstanding anti-fouling property. To sum up, this composite spun membrane shows a remarkable efficiency in the test and could be an ideal candidate for water treatment.