Molecularly imprinted nanofiber membranes from cellulose acetate aimed for chiral separation

Permselectivity and throughput (flux) are important specificity in membrane separation. It is an ultimate dream for membranologists to simultaneously enhance not only permselectivity but also flux, which generally show a trade-off relationship. A breakthrough in membrane separation would be realized by adopting membranes with higher surface area, which leads to higher molecular recognition site concentration, and higher porosity. Such separation membranes would be obtained by applying an electrospray deposition technique. To this end, in the present paper, molecularly imprinted nanofiber membranes were prepared from cellulose acetate (CA) and a print molecule, a derivative of optically pure glutamic acid, such as N-α-benzyloxycarbonyl-d-glutamic acid (Z-d-Glu) or N-α-benzyloxycarbonyl-l-glutamic acid (Z-l-Glu). Membrane performance of molecularly imprinted nanofiber membranes and usual molecularly imprinted membranes was compared in terms of adsorption selectivity, affinity constant, permselectivity, and flux. The results obtained in the present study revealed that electrospray deposition would be one of plausible methods to construct separation membranes to simultaneously enhance permselevtivity and flux.