Bioinspired and biomimetic membranes for water purification and chemical separation: A review

Abstract

Bioinspired and biomimetic membranes that contain biological transport channels or attain their structural designs from biological systems have been through a remarkable development over the last two decades. They take advantage of the exceptional transport properties of those channels, thus possess both high permeability and selectivity, and have emerged as a promising solution to existing membranes. Since the discovery of biological water channel proteins aquaporins (AQPs), extensive efforts have been made to utilize them to make separation membranes-AQP-based membranes, which have been commercialized. The exploration of AQPs’ unique structures and transport properties has resulted in the evolution of biomimetic separation materials from protein-based to artificial channel-based membranes. However, large-scale, defect-free biomimetic membranes are not available yet. This paper reviews the state-of-the-art biomimetic membranes and summarizes the latest research progress, platform, and methodology. Then it critically discusses the potential routes of this emerging area toward scalable applications. We conclude that an appropriate combination of bioinspired concepts and molecular engineering with mature polymer industry may lead to scalable polymeric membranes with intrinsic selective channels, which will gain the merit of both desired selectivity and scalability.

Review on Silver Nanoparticle Synthesis Method, Antibacterial Activity, Drug Delivery Vehicles, and Toxicity Pathways: Recent Advances and Future Aspects

“…Nanosilver-based disinfection solutions have the potential to be helpful in decontaminating surfaces, instruments in kindergartens and schools, various types of equipment, and computers, which could lead to the development of nanosilver-based consumer items in the future. Silver-based nanocomposites have the potential to be ecologically beneficial, and they may be used in the development of unique product applications [104,105].…”

Fluorofoldamer-Based Salt- and Proton-Rejecting Artificial Water Channels for Ultrafast Water Transport

“…Further, it is possible that the LA-enhanced water transport property might deteriorate over time or be altered by the complex environment of a water purification membrane. All these make both CNTP and 4-LA potentially less competitive for fabricating practical AWC-based biomimetic water purification membranes than 1 developed in this work (12,48).…”

“…The other type of AQPs, AQP1 that is present in specific human cells can transport ~ 1.1 × 10 10 H2O/s ( 9), yet with remarkably high water to monovalent ion selectivity over 10 9 . Integration of such water-permeating and salt-rejecting AQPs into polymer-based membranes represents an emerging approach for developing the next generation of water desalination and purification technology (10)(11)(12). Nevertheless, membrane proteins like AQPs usually suffer from high production costs, challenges with scalability, and questions about structural stability in abiotic environments (13), making them less ideal for large-scale industrial applications.…”

A bibliometric study on biomimetic and bioinspired membranes for water filtration

“…In summary, the research field of artificial water channels is still a fertile area of research and despite numerous advances made during the last two decades; there are major outstanding challenges where stabilization of the molecular complexes and ensuring efficient selectivity properties are among the pertinent challenges. Recent reviews may be referred for further details 64,65 .…”