SYNTHESIS AND CHARACTERISATION OF MULTILAYER POLYMER INCLUSION
MEMBRANES: EFFECT OF THE CHEMICAL NATURE OF POLYMERS
Abstract
The transport phenomena across polymeric membrane may be enhanced by
applying various strengths inside or outside the system. Recently,
polymer inclusion membrane (PIM) has been considered one of the most
popular methods that acts as a sink for the contaminant and immobilizes
it. In literature, there is no report about to achieve the synthesis of
multi-layer PIMs. In this paper, an improvement of a novel category of
membrane without carrier for performing ions separation was reported.
Different membranes were elaborated from binary mixtures of polymers,
cellulose triacetate (CTA), polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) and polyvinyl
chloride (PVC) using 2-Nitrophenyl octyle-ether (NPOE) as a plasticizer
in order to increase specific interactions between the different
polymers. The membranes (Polymer 1– Plasticizer – Polymer 2) were
synthesized by phase inversion method modified by changing the procedure
of a plasticizer addition and characterized by FTIR, XRD, TGA, SEM, zeta
potential and contact angle. The CTA-based membranes exhibited
well-defined pores completely filled with the second polymer and
plasticizer (NPOE). Surfaces of all synthesized membranes were found to
be smooth. The systems constituted by the mixture of (polymer 1 +
plasticizer + polymer 2) did not give any diffraction. Overall, our
results showed that the addition of the plasticizer resulted in
homogeneous membranes with modified physical properties, such as
thickness, and hydrophobicity. A study of transport of Pb(II) in
(CTA+NPOE+PMMA), (CTA+NPOE+PVC) and (PMMA+NPOE+PVC) membranes was
studied. Dialysis experiments of lead ions across a polymer inclusion
membrane has shown that (CTA+NPOE+PMMA) and (PMMA+NPOE+PVC) membranes
proved a good performance by fixing 12.15% and 25.31% of lead,
respectively. These results confirm the affinity between a basic polymer
(poly-methyl methacrylate) and the metallic ion (Pb2+).