Continuous thermal-rolling of electrospun nanofiber for polyamide layer deposition and its detection by engineered osmosis

Abstract

In this study, electrospun nanofiber was continuously sandwiched between two rubber rollers at high temperature (150 degrees C). The prepared nanofiber support layer possessed a pore size of 0.4 mu m (with narrow distribution) and a fiber diameter of 292 +/- 94 nm. Afterward, an interfacial polymerization was employed to deposit the selective polyamide layer on the nanofiber support layer. For the first time, engineered osmosis (EO) was used as a platform for verifying the presence of a polyamide selective layer on a nanofiber support layer. We found that the membrane prepared exhibited an excellent combination of permeability (30 L/m(2)h) and selectivity (17 g/m(2)h and 0.57 g/L) under a net pressure of 49 bar at the EO platform. The membrane developed can be applied to generate renewable energy using the EO process. In addition, the EO method can be used to detect selective polymer having a nano-scale thickness. (C) 2018 Published by Elsevier Ltd.