A multi-functional oil-water separator from a selectively pre-wetted superamphiphobic paper

Dengteng Ge; Lili Yang; Chenbo Wang; Elaine Lee; Yongquan Zhang; Shu Yang

doi:10.1039/c4cc09813g

A multi-functional oil-water separator from a selectively pre-wetted superamphiphobic paper

Chem Commun (Camb). 2015 Apr 11;51(28):6149-52. doi: 10.1039/c4cc09813g.

Authors

Dengteng Ge¹, Lili Yang, Chenbo Wang, Elaine Lee, Yongquan Zhang, Shu Yang

Affiliation

¹ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. shuyang@seas.upenn.edu.

PMID: 25750982
DOI: 10.1039/c4cc09813g

Abstract

A multi-functional oil-water separator is prepared from a paper towel spray coated with superamphiphobic (i.e., superhydrophobic and superoleophobic) nanoparticles. After the separator is pre-wetted with ethanol, followed by water, water can be removed from the light oil-water mixture and emulsions by gravity with high separation efficiency (99.9%) and separation flux. Vice versa, heavy oil can be removed by gravity on an ethanol-oil pre-wetted SA-paper.