Currently, the world is facing a severe water shortage caused by environmental pollution. Membrane separation is one of the most attractive technologies as to removing heavy metal ions and impurities from water due to its low energy consumption, avoider of chemical process and environmental friendliness. With membrane separation technique, the effect of selective adsorption and permeation of specific molecules and ions can be obtained. Graphene is a two-dimensional material with high mechanical stability and atomic thinness. Graphene oxide (GO) is graphene with oxygen functional groups, which is one of the prominent candidates that can be introduced in membrane technology. GO membrane has densely stacked structure and intrinsic defects, so it has subnano-level interlayer distances. These interlayer spacings and defects act as channels for selective permeability of water and gases depending on its morphology, surface properties and so on. Here, we focus on the properties of GO membranes fabricated by three different methods (vacuum-filtration, spray-coating and spin-coating) as a desalination membrane and its permeation performance. The properties were characterized by Raman, XRD, SEM and AFM, UV-vis and ICP-MS. In addition, we reduced GO membrane by thermal treatment and verified its permeation performance in a similar way. With these results, we investigated the relationship between the properties of GO and permeation characteristics and confirmed its possibility as a desalination membrane.

Characterization and permeation properties of graphene oxide membrane fabricated by various methods for desalination

2019 Fall National Meeting

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