Functionalized graphene oxide-based lamellar membranes for organic solvent nanofiltration applications

Ashique Hussain Jatoi; Kyung Hwan Kim; Muhammad Ali Khan; Fida Hussain Memon; Muzaffar Iqbal; Dahar Janwery; Shah Nawaz Phulpoto; Anupama Samantasinghar; Kyung Hyun Choi; Khalid Hussain Thebo

doi:10.1039/d3ra00223c

Functionalized graphene oxide-based lamellar membranes for organic solvent nanofiltration applications

RSC Adv. 2023 Apr 25;13(19):12695-12702. doi: 10.1039/d3ra00223c. eCollection 2023 Apr 24.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry, Shaheed Benazir Bhutto University Shaheed Benazirabad 67480 Pakistan.
² BioSpero, Inc. Jeju Republic of Korea.
³ Institute of Chemical Sciences, Bahauddin Zakariya University Multan 60800 Pakistan.
⁴ Department of Mechatronics Engineering, Jeju National University Jeju 63243 Republic of Korea amm@jejunu.ac.kr.
⁵ Department of Electrical Engineering, Sukkur IBA University Sukkur 65200 Pakistan.
⁶ Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Physical and Applied Sciences, The University of Haripur KPK 22620 Pakistan.
⁷ National Centre of Excellence in Analytical Chemistry, University of Sindh Jamshoro Pakistan.
⁸ Department of Molecular Biology & Genetics, Shaheed Benazir University Shaheed Benazirabad 67480 Pakistan.
⁹ Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Shenyang 110016 China Khalidthebo@yahoo.com.

Abstract

In this study, two-dimensional graphene oxide-based novel membranes were fabricated by modifying the surface of graphene oxide nanosheets with six-armed poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) at room conditions. The as-modified PEGylated graphene oxide (PGO) membranes with unique layered structures and large interlayer spacing (∼1.12 nm) were utilized for organic solvent nanofiltration applications. The as-prepared 350 nm-thick PGO membrane offers a superior separation (>99%) against evans blue, methylene blue and rhodamine B dyes along with high methanol permeance ∼ 155 ± 10 L m^-2 h^-1, which is 10-100 times high compared to pristine GO membranes. Additionally, these membranes are stable for up to 20 days in organic solvent. Hence the results suggested that the as-synthesized PGO membranes with superior separation efficiency for dye molecules in organic solvent can be used in future for organic solvent nanofiltration application.