Development of Ruthenium Oxide Modified Polyethersulfone Membranes for Improvement of Antifouling Performance Including Decomposition Kinetic of Polymer

Abstract

In this study, RuO2-embedded PES membrane was prepared and it was used for protein separation. The antifouling properties of the fabricated composite membranes were also investigated using bovine serum albumin (BSA) as protein solution. The mean roughness increased proportionally by introducing RuO2 particles. The porosity of the composite membranes was higher than that of the pristine PES membrane. On the other hand, composite membranes has smaller average pore size after addition of RuO2 particles. The blending of RuO2 particles to the PES membrane caused to increase the hydrophilicity. The contact angle was measured 76.67 ± 1.21°, 73.23 ± 0.84°, 70.28 ± 0.77°, and 67.13 ± 0.80° for pristine PES, PES/RuO2 0.50 wt%., PES/RuO2 0.75 wt%., and PES/RuO2 1.00 wt%, respectively. The pure water flux of the membranes decreased from 439.7 to 379.3 L/m2/h for the pristine PES and PES/RuO2 1.00 wt%. The pore size was calculated as 16.47 nm for the pristine PES and pore size decreased up to 6.05 nm when RuO2 particles increased up to 1.00 wt%. BSA fluxes were 84.1 ± 2.1, 86.3 ± 2.5, and 93.9 ± 3.2 L/m2/h for pristine, PES/RuO2 0.50 wt%, and PES/RuO2 0.75 wt% membranes, respectively. PES/RuO2 1.00 wt%. membrane supplied the lowest BSA flux (73.6 ± 3.1 L/m2/h). BSA rejection efficiencies increased from 45.5 ± 1.8% to 92.6 ± 1.5% when blended RuO2 particles increased from 0 to 1.00 wt%. The results depicted that Rir values decreased while Rr values increased after the blending of RuO2. The thermal studies of the PES/RuO2 membranes were also performed by DTA/TG. The Activation Energy (Ea) values of the PES/RuO2 membranes were found to be 57.67-641.34 kJ/mol for Flynn-Wall-Ozawa (FWO) and 55.13–659.10 kJ/mol for Kissenger-Akahira-Sunose (KAS).Graphical Abstract