Evaluations of polyelectrolyte multilayer membranes assembled by a dynamic layer-by-layer technique

Self-assembly of polyelectrolyte multilayer membranes (PEMMs) by using dynamic layer-by-layer (LBL) adsorption technique was conducted in this study. The polyethyleneimine (PEI) and polyacrylic acid (PAA) were alternatively deposited on the hydrolyzed polyacrylonitrile (PAN) ultrafiltration membranes under a pressure of 0.1 MPa. The changes of membrane surfaces were observed by using atomic force microscopy. It was found that the regularity of the PEMMs was enhanced after the dynamic LBL assembly. The pervaporation separation behavior of various alcohol/water mixtures with the alcohols being t-butanol, 2-propanol and ethanol are compared with a relatively wide range of feed temperature and concentration.