STTR Phase I: Extremely fouling-resistant nanofiltration membranes treating organic-rich wastewater

STTR 第一阶段：极耐污染的纳滤膜处理富含有机物的废水

• 批准号: 1843847
• 负责人: Christopher Drover
• 金额: $ 22.5万
• 依托单位: ZWITTERCO, LLC
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-02-01 至 2020-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1843847&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: STTR; Phase; Extremely; fouling; resistant

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) project will be a low-cost, high-performance nanofiltration membrane technology for removing oils, pollutants, and organic materials from highly contaminated wastewater. Industrial activity in the U.S. produces more than 25 billion gallons of wastewater every day, much of contaminated with oils, greases, solvents, and other harmful chemical compounds. Existing filtration membranes are easily clogged and damaged by these oily materials, suffering a rapid decline in performance. Safely processing this wastewater by conventional means costs U.S. industrial facilities more than $40B per year. A breakthrough in nanofiltration technology will allow industries across the country - such as food processors, landfills, power plants, and paper mills - to easily and affordably clean their wastewater. This STTR Phase I project proposes to develop the technology and processes to produce commercial-scale anti-fouling nanofiltration membranes for use with highly contaminated industrial wastewater. The project will combine large-scale manufacturing techniques such as high-precision spray coating with a novel chemistry platform based on zwitterionic copolymers to produce high-performance, low-cost membranes. These polymers exhibit extraordinary resistance to organic fouling as well as pore self-assembly at the nanometer scale. To achieve the required performance, the project will develop the process and materials to achieve a thickness of less than one micron in the selective layer of a thin-film composite. Currently, layers of this thickness are only achievable using in-situ polymerization of nylon-based polymers, which are costly, have low permeability, and are intolerant of oxidizing conditions. This project will overcome these limitations by exploiting the unique self-assembly behavior of zwitterionic copolymers to achieve ultrathin, uniformly porous films in both flat sheet and hollow fiber forms. The project will furthermore demonstrate the chemical robustness of these membranes with accelerated lifecycle testing relevant to industrial conditions. Commercial-scale production of self-assembling polymer membranes will represent a significant breakthrough for materials in this class.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

这个小企业技术转让（STTR）项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力将是一种低成本，高性能的纳滤膜技术，用于从高度污染的废水中去除油，污染物和有机材料。美国的工业活动每天产生超过250亿加仑的废水，其中大部分被油、油脂、溶剂和其他有害化合物污染。现有的过滤膜很容易被这些油性材料堵塞和损坏，性能迅速下降。通过传统方法安全处理这些废水每年花费美国工业设施超过400亿美元。纳滤技术的突破将使全国各地的行业--如食品加工厂、垃圾填埋场、发电厂和造纸厂米尔斯--能够轻松、经济地清洁废水。该STTR第一阶段项目旨在开发生产用于高度污染工业废水的商业规模防污纳滤膜的技术和工艺。该项目将联合收割机大规模生产技术，如高精度喷涂与基于两性离子共聚物的新型化学平台相结合，以生产高性能，低成本的膜。这些聚合物表现出非凡的抗有机污染以及在纳米尺度上的孔自组装。为了实现所需的性能，该项目将开发工艺和材料，以实现薄膜复合材料的选择层厚度小于1微米。目前，这种厚度的层只能使用尼龙基聚合物的原位聚合来实现，其成本高，具有低渗透性，并且不耐受氧化条件。该项目将通过利用两性离子共聚物独特的自组装行为来克服这些限制，以实现平板和中空纤维形式的均匀多孔膜。该项目还将通过与工业条件相关的加速生命周期测试来证明这些膜的化学稳健性。自组装聚合物膜的商业规模生产将代表这类材料的重大突破。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

Fouling- and Chlorine-Resistant Nanofiltration Membranes Fabricated from Charged Zwitterionic Amphiphilic Copolymers

• DOI: 10.1021/acsapm.1c01940
• 发表时间: 2022-03
• 期刊: ACS Applied Polymer Materials
• 影响因子: 5
• 作者: Samuel J. Lounder;A. Asatekin

Zwitterionic Ion-Selective Membranes with Tunable Subnanometer Pores and Excellent Fouling Resistance

• DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemmater.1c00374
• 发表时间: 2021-06-04
• 期刊: CHEMISTRY OF MATERIALS
• 影响因子: 8.6
• 作者: Lounder, Samuel J.;Asatekin, Ayse
• 通讯作者: Asatekin, Ayse

Interaction-based ion selectivity exhibited by self-assembled, cross-linked zwitterionic copolymer membranes

• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2022198118
• 发表时间: 2021-09-14
• 期刊: PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
• 影响因子: 11.1
• 作者: Lounder, Samuel J.;Asatekin, Ayse
• 通讯作者: Asatekin, Ayse