Facile surface modification of anion-exchange membranes for improvement of diffusion dialysis performance

•A facile membrane modification by an interfacial polymerization of pyrrole is proposed.•Polypyrrole is shown to be effective material to repel metal cations.•High acid permeability is maintained at nearly optimum modification condition.•The surface modification by polypyrrole largely improves the acid dialysis performance.

In this study, a facile membrane modification method by spin-coating of pyrrole (Py) monomers dissolved in a volatile solvent followed by an interfacial polymerization is proposed. The surface of a commercial anion-exchange membrane (i.e., Neosepta-AFX, Astom Corp., Japan) was successfully modified with polypyrrole (Ppy) to improve the acid recovery performance in diffusion dialysis (DD). The result of DD experiments revealed that both the acid and metal ion transports are significantly influenced by the surface modification. The metal crossover through the membranes was largely reduced while mostly maintaining the acid permeability by introducing a thin Ppy layer with excellent repelling property to cations on the membrane surface. As a result, the anion-exchange membrane modified with the optimum content of Py monomer (5 vol.%) exhibited excellent acid dialysis coefficient (KAcid) and selectivity (KAcid/KMetal) which is approximately twice as high as that of the pristine membrane.

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