Enzymatically-boosted ionic liquid gas separation membranes using carbonic anhydrase of biomass origin

•Carbonic anhydrase from spinach was used to fabricate supported ionic liquid membranes.•The enzyme preparation facilitated CO2 transport and separation.•The membranes showed good time-stability for multiple cycles.

Nowadays there is a huge demand for new and sustainable technologies aiming the reduction of the greenhouse gas, in particular carbon dioxide emission. In this work, enzymatically-boosted supported ionic liquid membrane (EB-SILM) was developed to permeate carbon dioxide with improved efficiency. Firstly, the selected biocatalyst, carbonic anhydrase (CA) was prepared and purified from spinach, a cheap plant biomass containing the enzyme of our interest. Afterwards, the CA enzyme preparation was used for SILM fabrication in order to test the properties towards enhanced carbon dioxide permeation over CH4, H2 and N2. The results indicate basically that EB-SILMs possess an increased ability to permeate CO2 in comparison with enzymeless controls and therefore, may be viewed as a promising approach e.g. towards enhanced CO2-capture bioprocesses.