Abstract
A nanofiber membrane with a high surface-to-volume ratio has advantages in applications such as those used for particulate matter filtration and gas detection. To maximize the potentials of the membrane structure, recent research has been attempted to control nanofiber geometries. In this paper, surface modification of a nanofiber membrane with a metal/ceramic nanostructure is performed to improve multi-functional filter performance, enhancing fine particle filtration and toxic gas absorption. Here, a smart filter is fabricated by electrospinning polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) nanofiber onto a nylon mesh and hydrothermal synthesis of ZnO nanoparticles onto a nanowire array on a PVDF nanofiber surface. On the ZnO nanowires–PVDF nanofiber layer filter, the pressure difference (ΔP = 4.13 kPa) is higher than the pure PVDF nanofiber layer. However, the filtration efficiency is 94.3% for a 0.3 μm particle size, which is higher than that of other sizes. Additionally, a ZnO nanowire array with high density on a PVDF nanofiber layer affects sensitivity (S = 39.37), with high resolution. The photocurrent characteristics of a smart filter have the potential for a photo-assisted redox reaction to detect toxic polar molecules in continuous airflow in real-time in indoor environments.
Highlights
Micro/nanostructure-based thin film fabrication technology are used in a wide range of industries and research fields for integration systems and device applications, and are related to energy applications such as flexible electronics, soft photonics, supercapacitors, and surface modification [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]
A multifunctional smart filter to perform particulate matter (PM) capture and photo-detection was fabricated by electrospinning for polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) NF layer formation and low-temperature hydrothermal synthesis for zinc oxide (ZnO) NW growth
NF layer, the surface energy is converted from hydrophobicity (130.1◦ ) to hydrophilicity
Summary
Micro/nanostructure-based thin film fabrication technology are used in a wide range of industries and research fields for integration systems and device applications, and are related to energy applications such as flexible electronics, soft photonics, supercapacitors, and surface modification [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. The characteristics of the high surface-area-to-volume ratio of the hierarchical structure dramatically enhances performance to achieve their applications. These characteristics provide a large number of active sites that can be utilized for ion transfer in batteries [3], detecting gas with high sensitivity and fast response in sensors [5], and controlling cell behavior using a high-density functional group on the film surface [7]. A nanofiber net filter structure shows a high filtration efficiency of over 99.9%, with a low pressure drop (
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