Doping of polyethersulfone nanofiltration membranes: antifouling effect observed at ultralow concentrations of TiO2 nanoparticles

Doping of nanofiltration membranes with TiO2 nanoparticles was studied in the ultralow concentration range, in the absence of photocatalysis. Blended polyethersulfone/TiO2 flat-sheet membranes were manufactured and investigated in terms of pure water flux, permeability, fouling resistance and solute rejection. The membranes were synthesized at four different polymer concentrations by the phase inversion method, using 1-methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP) and deionized water as solvent and coagulant, respectively. The influence of TiO2 addition was investigated in an unusually low concentration interval (0.035–0.375 wt%). The membrane morphology was studied by determining particle size distributions of TiO2 to explore the effect of nanoparticle aggregation. Furthermore, membranes were characterized by hydrophilicity (contact angle), morphology (SEM), porosity, mechanical strength (bursting pressure) and thermal analysis (TGA). Membrane fouling was studied with humic acids as model organic foulants. Overall, a remarkable improvement in the permeability was observed with the addition of ultralow amounts of nanoparticles to the polymer. The optimum permeability was found to be as low as 0.085 wt%, using a constant rejection of dyes as the boundary condition. It was shown that rejection of solutes is not negatively influenced by the increase in permeability. In addition, the resistance against membrane fouling was found to be above 12% for the TiO2 blended membranes.