Polyphenol‐Sensitized Atomic Layer Deposition for Membrane Interface Hydrophilization

Abstract

Improvements in energy-water systems will necessitate fabrication of high-performance separation membranes. To this end, interface engineering is a powerful tool for tailoring properties, and atomic layer deposition (ALD) has recently emerged as a promising and versatile approach. However, most non-polar polymeric membranes are not amenable to ALD processing due to the absence of nucleation sites. Here, a sensitization strategy for ALD-coating is presented, illustrated by membrane interface hydrophilization. Facile dip-coating with polyphenols effectively sensitizes hydrophobic polymer membranes to TiO 2 ALD coating. Tannic acid-sensitized ALD-coated membranes exhibit outstanding underwater crude oil repulsion and rigorous mechanical stability through bending and rinsing tests. As a result, these membranes demonstrate outstanding crude oil-inwater separation and reusability compared to untreated membranes or those treated with ALD without polyphenol pretreatment. A possible polyphenolsensitized ALD mechanism is proposed involving initial island nucleation followed by film intergrowth. This polyphenol sensitization strategy enriches the functionalization toolbox in material science, interface engineering, and environmental science.

Grand Challenges in Emerging Separation Technologies

“…For example, advanced separation membranes technology enables such a green process that can greatly reduce the energy consumption and the carbon and space intensity of conventional distillation processes for separation and purification of compounds (Jimenez-Solomon et al, 2016;Liu et al, 2016;Wang et al, 2018Wang et al, , 2019Zhang et al, 2019). Significantly, the energy consumption of per liter in the emerging membrane separation process is about 1/25 times as much as in the conventional distillation process (Rundquist et al, 2012;Yang et al, 2020).…”

Atomic Layer Deposition for Polypropylene Film Engineering—A Review

“…In addition to plasma and acid, Yang et al utilized dip‐coating of the surface by tannic acid to enhance the polarity and thus the activity of inert and nonpolar PVDF membrane before using ALD. [ 94 ] Enhanced surface hydrophilization via combined phenol‐dip/TiO 2 ‐ALD process generated new generation antifouling PVDF membranes useful for high‐efficiency recovery of wastewater containing high concentration crude oil. The dip coating of polar molecules like tannic acid onto PVDF surface has been proven by Yang et al to share potentiality in pre‐ALD PP surface activation.…”

Water treatment based on atomically engineered materials: Atomic layer deposition and beyond

“…SIS-grown materials have mainly focused on oxides owing to its comparatively short development history. 27 ALD/SIS-grown materials can realize many kinds of functions, such as catalysis, 50,51 hydration/rigidity-enabled antifouling, 52,53 and charge regulation, 54 by virtue of engineering various organic-inorganic composite coatings using different precursors and incubation conditions. For instance, ZnO and TiO 2 may provide photocatalytic properties owing to the generation of reactive charge carriers and subsequent degradation of pollutants when illuminated with UV light in an aqueous environment.…”