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Development of High-Performance Polymers for Membranes Applied to Gas and Liquid Separations

A special issue of Polymers (ISSN 2073-4360). This special issue belongs to the section "Polymer Membranes and Films".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 June 2025 | Viewed by 1515

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Manuel Aguilar Vega

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Materials Unit, Centro de Investigación Científica de Yucatán A.C., Merida 97205, Mexico
Interests: development of membranes for natural gas sweetening and production of high-value streams; membrane system for improved water desalination systems NF and RO; ionic membranes for fuel cell membranes and energy applications; membranes; gas separation; water treatment; ionic membranes
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. María Ortencia González-Díaz

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Centro de Investigación Científica de Yucatán A.C., Mérida 97205, Mexico
Interests: synthesis of functionalized block copolymers and their application as catalytic membranes; synthesis of Biobased polymers and recycling and reuse of polymers for circular economy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Interest in membranes for liquid and gas separation has increased in recent decades due to their small size and energy-efficient separation capabilities in a number of separation processes. Organic polymers are preferred over membrane preparation due to their flexibility and the feasibility to tailor their properties to achieve the desired separation. Membranes from high-performance polymers may be tailored for gas, vapor, or liquid separation in order to overcome limiting situations. High-performance polymers for membrane preparation can also be designed to develop specific morphologies that, depending on their application, could be porous or microporous, phase-segregated, or modified with suitable functional groups to achieve flux and selective separation performance in a given process. Even though there is a large number of polymer materials reported, there is a need for research towards tailoring high-performance polymers for membrane selective performance for applications that require larger selectivity while maintaining the flux of a desired species in molecular gases, vapors, and liquids separation. Opportunities to develop high-performance polymers for membranes arise from the need for materials suitable for molecular separations in, for example, composite or ultrathin membranes or polymers bearing suitable functional groups to achieve specific separations.

Dr. Manuel Aguilar Vega
Dr. María Ortencia González-Díaz
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Polymers is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • high-performance polymers preparation
  • membranes
  • gas separation
  • liquid separation
  • composite membranes
  • membrane characterization

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

19 pages, 2724 KiB  
Article
Carbon Molecular Sieve Membranes from Acenaphthenequinone–Biphenyl Polymer; Synthesis, Characterization, and Effect on Gas Separation and Transport Properties
by Jesús Ortiz-Espinoza, Olivia Hernández-Cruz, Mikhail Zolotukhin, F. Alberto Ruiz-Treviño, María Isabel Loría-Bastarrachea and Manuel Aguilar-Vega
Polymers 2025, 17(4), 541; https://doi.org/10.3390/polym17040541 - 19 Feb 2025
Viewed by 543
Abstract
A rigid, high temperature-resistant aromatic polymer, poly(1,1′-biphenyl)-6,8a-dihydroacenaphthylene-1(2H)-one (BDA) comprising acenaphthenequinone and biphenyl was successfully synthesized by superacid catalyzed polymerization. BDA has a high decomposition temperature (Td = 520 °C) that renders it a viable candidate for carbon molecular sieve membranes (CMSM) formation. [...] Read more.
A rigid, high temperature-resistant aromatic polymer, poly(1,1′-biphenyl)-6,8a-dihydroacenaphthylene-1(2H)-one (BDA) comprising acenaphthenequinone and biphenyl was successfully synthesized by superacid catalyzed polymerization. BDA has a high decomposition temperature (Td = 520 °C) that renders it a viable candidate for carbon molecular sieve membranes (CMSM) formation. BDA precursor pyrolysis at 600 °C (BDA-P600) leads to a carbon turbostratic structure formation with graphene-like amorphous strands in a matrix with micropores and ultramicropores, resulting in a carbon structure with higher diffusion and higher selectivity than dense BDA. When the BDA pyrolysis temperature is raised to 700 °C (BDA-P700), the average stacking number of carbon layers N increases, along with an increase in the crystallite thickness stacking Lc, and layer plane size La, leading to a more compact structure. Pure gas permeability coefficients P are between 3 and 5 times larger for BDA-P600 compared to the BDA precursors. On the other hand, there is a P decrease between 10 and 50% for O2 and CO2 between CMSM BDA-P600 and BDA-P700, while the large kinetic diameter gases N2 and CH4 show a large decrease in permeability of 44 and 67%, respectively. It was found that the BDA-P700 WAXD results show the emergence of a new peak at 2θ = 43.6° (2.1 Å), which effectively hinders the diffusion of gases such O2, N2, and CH4. This behavior has been attributed to the formation of new micropores that become increasingly compact at higher pyrolysis temperatures. As a result, the CMSM derived from BDA precursors pyrolyzed at 700 °C (BDA-P700) show exceptional O2/N2 gas separation performance, significantly surpassing baseline trade-off limits. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Development of High-Performance Polymers for Membranes Applied to Gas and Liquid Separations)
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13 pages, 2059 KiB  
Article
Increasing the Permeability of Polyphenylene Sulfone Hollow Fiber Ultrafiltration Membranes by Switching the Polymer End Groups
by Alisa Raeva, Dmitry Matveev, Tatyana Anokhina, Azamat A. Zhansitov, Svetlana Khashirova, Vladimir Volkov and Ilya Borisov
Polymers 2025, 17(1), 53; https://doi.org/10.3390/polym17010053 - 29 Dec 2024
Viewed by 724
Abstract
The influence of the molecular weight and chemical structure of polyphenylene sulfone (PPSU) end groups on the formation of the porous structure of ultrafiltration (UF) hollow fiber membranes was investigated. Polymers with a molecular weight ranging from 67 to 81 kg/mol and with [...] Read more.
The influence of the molecular weight and chemical structure of polyphenylene sulfone (PPSU) end groups on the formation of the porous structure of ultrafiltration (UF) hollow fiber membranes was investigated. Polymers with a molecular weight ranging from 67 to 81 kg/mol and with a hydroxyl-to-chlorine end group ratio ranging from 0.43 to 17.0 were synthesized. The excess of end groups was achieved during polymer synthesis by adding one of the following monomers: hydroxyl (excess DHBP) or chlorine (excess DCDPS). For the first time, it was found that the stability of PPSU solutions is determined not by the molecular weight of the polymer, but by the chemical structure of its end groups. The stability of polymer solutions increases with the increasing proportion of chlorine groups. The SEM method showed that with the increasing molar fraction of chlorine end groups in the polymer, a more open porous structure forms on the outer surface of the hollow fiber membranes derived from it. The maximum UF permeance of the hollow fiber membranes for water was achieved with the PPSU sample containing the highest chlorine end group content, amounting to 136 L/(m2·h·bar), with a high rejection of the model substance Blue Dextran (at 94.7%). This represents the best result currently reported among unmodified PPSU hollow fiber membranes. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Development of High-Performance Polymers for Membranes Applied to Gas and Liquid Separations)
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