Biopolymer-Based Nanofibrous Membrane for Water Purification Treatment

Abstract

The availability of the resources is limited due to ever increasing population, unplanned urbanization, industrialization, and improper waste management. Currently, one of the most important environmental issues is water pollution. The bacteria, viruses, intestinal parasites, and other pathogenic microorganisms mainly contaminated the drinking water and it causes the diseases such as diarrhea, dysentery, and typhoid. In 2015, the World Health Organization has reported that 321 children were killed every day by diarrhea. Globally, every year 1.8 million people mostly under 5 years died due to diarrheal diseases alone which is mainly related to water. At present, chemical disinfectants (e.g., chlorine) and polymer membrane-based water filtration system are employed to manage microbial pathogens in the water. The by-products of the chemical disinfectants are highly harmful and problematic. The major concerns in the water filtration of polymer membranes are biofouling and virus penetration. Furthermore, the membrane-based water filtration has several challenges including membrane permeability, lifetime, and energy costs. Therefore, interconnected, highly porous nanofibrous polymer membrane filtration could be used to overcome these technical challenges. Owing to lightweight, high permeability, and small pore size, nanofibrous polymer membranes can be potential candidates to remove unwanted smaller particles in the water. The performance of the nanofibrous membrane depends on their fiber thickness, distribution, pore size, porosity, and tortuosity factor. Nanofibrous membrane with desired properties can be obtained for water filtration by electrospinning technique. The antimicrobial activity of the polymer nanofibrous membrane can be further improved by the incorporation of metal oxide nanoparticles because of their good antimicrobial effects. Due to the high antimicrobial effect, zinc oxide nanoparticles have been widely incorporated with polymer to produce nanofibrous membrane for water filtration. In particular, zinc oxide nanoparticles incorporated with bio-based polymer (cellulose acetate) nanofibrous membranes showed potential material for water filtration to ensure safe and easy access drinking water.