Temporospatial Confined Catalytic Membranes with Controlled Diffusion-Reaction for Ultrafast Water Purification

Catalytic membrane is an appealing technology for eliminating refractory organic pollutants in comparison to conventional advanced oxidation methods. However, the application of this technology is constrained by the trade-off between membrane permeability and reactivity. Herein, we prepared a tubular macroporous catalytic membrane (MCM), which activated peroxymonosulfate to produce dominant singlet oxygen (1O2) and hydroxyl radicals (•OH) in the macropore channel (∼130 nm). The optimized MCM membrane demonstrated catalytic filtration performance far beyond the state-of-the-art, achieving >99% degradation of antibiotics, dyes, and phenolic compounds while simultaneously exhibiting ultrafast permeance (645.3 L m–2 h–1 bar–1). For the first time, we reveal the spatial distribution of shorter-lived •OH and long-lived 1O2 in the macropore channel via a diffusion-reaction kinetic model, which provides fundamental insights into how these two reactive oxygen species work synergistically to offer opportunities for breaking the permeability–reactivity trade-off. Furthermore, the MCM achieved robust and stable removal of total organic carbon for a real high-salinity wastewater, verifying its practical potential for treating refractory organics.