Abstract
Porous monoliths prepared using templates are highly sought after for filtration applications due to their good mass transport properties and high permeability. Current templates, however, often lead to the formation of dead-end pores and irregular pore distributions, which reduce the efficiency of the substrate flow across the monolith column. This study focused on the preparation of a microsphere-templated porous monolith for wastewater filtration. The optimal template/monomer ratio (50:50, 60:40, 70:30) was determined, and appropriate template removal techniques were assessed for the formation of homogenous pores. The physicochemical characteristics and pore homogeneity of the monoliths were examined. The 60:40 ratio was determined to result in monoliths with homogeneous pore distributions ranging from 1.9 μm to 2.3 μm. SEM and FTIR investigations revealed that solvent treatment was effective for removing templates from the resulting solid monolith. The water quality assessments revealed reductions in the turbidity and the total number of suspended particles in the tested wastewater of up to 96–99%. The findings of this study provide insightful knowledge regarding the fabrication of monoliths with homogenous pores that are beneficial for wastewater treatment.
Highlights
The past decade has witnessed the advancement of monoliths as an important technology in diverse applications including separation [1], filtration [2], biomolecule purification [3] and chromatography systems [4]
It can be seen that the particle diameter increased with increasing polymer concentration
Based on the findings reported by Ibadat, Ongkudon, Saallah and Misson [15], solutions prepared at 10 wt% polystyrene produce well-shaped microsphere particles compared to the formation of aggregated particles at a high concentration (40%)
Summary
The past decade has witnessed the advancement of monoliths as an important technology in diverse applications including separation [1], filtration [2], biomolecule purification [3] and chromatography systems [4]. Polystyrene microspheres have been used extensively as hard templates for various hollow spherical materials [16] due to their good features, which include low density, high surface area, excellent charge capacity, and high permeability. These properties have made them highly applicable in various industrially important applications in biocatalysis and immobilization systems [13,17]. Polystyrene-based microspheres were investigated as monolith templates in this study It has traditionally been a major challenge to produce monoliths with a well-ordered structure. In the present work, a procedure for preparing porous monoliths using polystyrene-based microsphere templates is reported. The performance of the fabricated monolith for wastewater filtration to remove particulate matter was assessed
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