Preparation and Gas Separation Properties of Metal-Organic Framework Membranes

Continuous and intergrown metal-organic framework (MOF) membranes, MIL-100(In) (MIL represents Materials Institute Lavoisier), were prepared directly on porous anodic alumina oxide (AAO) membranes using an in situ crystallization method. The pore surface of MIL-100(In) is conferred with polarity due to the presence of the 1, 3,5-benzenetricarboxylic acid. The thickness of MIL-100(In) membranes was tuned by varying the reactant concentration of indium chloride and 1, 3,5-benzenetricarboxylic acid. Single gas permeation measurements on this MOF membrane indicate the large permeances of 0.90 × 10 –6 and 0.81 × 10 –6 mol · m –2 ·s –1 ·Pa –1 for CO 2 and CH 4 , and relatively high ideal selective factors of 3.75 and 3.38 for CO 2 /N 2 and CH 4 /N 2 , respectively.