Effect of the surface modification of polymer membranes on their microbiological fouling

A comprehensive review on surface modified polymer membranes for biofouling mitigation

“…In an attempt to enhance the membrane resistance to biofouling MF PES and PVDF membranes were photochemically modified with a thin layer of a number of hydrophilic polymers: neutral poly(HEMA), negatively charged poly(AMPS), and positively charged and bactericidal poly(qDMAEM) [88]. Higher grafting values were obtained for HEMA compared with qDMAEM and AMPS monomers.…”

“…Degree of modification of the composite membranes is 500 ± 20 μg/cm 2 . The concentration of suspension is 1.58 × 10 4 CFU/cm 3 , operating pressure is 0.5 bars and filtration time is 1 h [88]. ⁎ J c1 and J c2 are the membrane fluxes at the beginning and at the end of filtration cycle, respectively; ⁎⁎ J 0 and J 1 are the initial water flux and water flux after filtration of the bacterial suspension and washing with distilled water.…”

“…Photograph of initial PVDF membrane (left) and PVDF membrane with grafted qDMAEM with degree of modification of 710 μg/cm 2 (right) after filtration of E. coli suspension with a concentration of 60 CFU/cm 3 and incubation at Tergitol 7 medium at 37°C for 24 h[88].…”

Surface Functionalization by Grafting (2-Dimethylamino)ethyl Methacrylate Methyl Chloride Quaternary Salt (DMAEMAq) onto Hollow Fiber Polyethersulfone (PES) Membranes for Improvement of Antibiofouling Properties

“…This is due to the antibacterial property of the QA groups grafted onto the membrane surface. The bacteria were killed by a contact killing mechanism [35][36][37][38] when the bacteria were adsorbed on the membrane surface due to the attractive electrostatic force, because the E. coli has a negative charge and the PES-g-DMAEMAq membrane has a positive charge. From zeta potential measurements, the surface charge of the PES-g-DMAEMAq membrane was +35 mV (data not shown here).…”

“…These positive charges could provide a bactericidal effect by a contact killing mechanism [20,21,[34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41].…”