para-Xylene Ultra-selective Zeolite MFI Membranes Fabricated from Nanosheet Monolayers at the Air-Water Interface

Donghun Kim; Mi Young Jeon; Benjamin L Stottrup; Michael Tsapatsis

doi:10.1002/anie.201708835

para-Xylene Ultra-selective Zeolite MFI Membranes Fabricated from Nanosheet Monolayers at the Air-Water Interface

Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2018 Jan 8;57(2):480-485. doi: 10.1002/anie.201708835. Epub 2017 Dec 11.

Authors

Donghun Kim¹, Mi Young Jeon¹, Benjamin L Stottrup², Michael Tsapatsis¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of Minnesota, 421 Washington Ave. SE, Minneapolis, MN, 55455, USA.
² Department of Physics, Augsburg University, 2211 Riverside Avenue, Minneapolis, MN, 55454, USA.

PMID: 29194920
DOI: 10.1002/anie.201708835

Abstract

The control of membrane morphology and microstructure is crucial to improve the separation performance of molecular-sieve membranes. This can be enabled by making thin, dense, and uniform seed-crystal coatings, which are then intergrown into continuous membranes. Herein, we show a novel and simple floating particle coating method can give closely packed monolayers of zeolite nanosheets on nonporous or porous supports. The zeolite nanosheet monolayer is formed at the air-water interface in a conical Teflon trough. As the water in the trough is drained, the monolayer is deposited on a support placed below. Membranes prepared by gel-free secondary growth of the nanosheets deposited by this method show unprecedented ultra-selective performance for separation of para- from ortho-xylene (separation factor >10 000).

Keywords: gas separations; membranes; monolayers; xylene; zeolites.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.