Performance of Teflon- reinforced Nafion against microbes and removal of heavy metal ions from aqueous environment

Abstract

Considering its promising antimicrobial and metal removal capabilities, water filtration systems have not yet widely used ionic polymer membranes. A textile structure made of Nafion polymer reinforced with Teflon (TFRN) was coated with non-precious metals copper and silver using a chemical decomposition technique. Scanning electron microscopy makes it quite evident that a surface coating was formed with evenly distributed metal particles. Water and moisture uptake capacity for Silver (Ag)-Copper (Cu) coated membrane was reduced by 80 and 67 % respectively compared to pure membrane. Inaddition, Ag–Cu coated membrane showed best performance against Escherichia coli (ATCC25922), and Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 25923) with 2.04 and 1.7 CFU/ml respectively, by considering below level of Quantification as 1.6 CFU/ml. Pure Nafion membrane at pH 6.5, was used to perform the adsorption studies of transition metal ions like Copper, Nickel, Chromium, Barium, Tin and Arsenic at room temperature. The maximum metal ion removal was about 35 % for Copper followed by Nickel (31 %) and the least adsorption was observed for Barium (13.5 %) from multi-heavy metals solution. The study revealed that the potential of TFRN membrane for water purification in terms of metal and microbial removal process.