TY - JOUR
T1 - Control of biofouling on reverse osmosis polyamide membranes modified with biocidal nanoparticles and antifouling polymer brushes
AU - Rahaman, Md. Saifur
AU - Thérien-Aubin, Héloïse
AU - Ben-Sasson, Moshe
AU - Ober, Christopher Kemper
AU - Nielsen, Melissa
AU - Elimelech, Menachem
N1 - KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-01
Acknowledged KAUST grant number(s): KUS-C1-018-02
Acknowledgements: The authors thank Yue Wang and Prof. E. P. Giannelis for providing the AgNPs. M. S. R thanks the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada for financial support. H. T. A. thanks the Fond Quebecois de la Recherche en Nature et Technologie for a postdoctoral fellowship. The authors are grateful to the Cornell-KAUST research center for financial support (Award no. KUS-C1-018-02) and to the Cornell Center for Materials Research (CCMR), which is supported by NSF, for use of its facilities.
This publication acknowledges KAUST support, but has no KAUST affiliated authors.
PY - 2014
Y1 - 2014
N2 - Thin-film composite (TFC) polyamide reverse osmosis (RO) membranes are prone to biofouling due to their inherent physicochemical surface properties. In order to address the biofouling problem, we have developed novel surface coatings functionalized with biocidal silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) and antifouling polymer brushes via polyelectrolyte layer-by-layer (LBL) self-assembly. The novel surface coating was prepared with polyelectrolyte LBL films containing poly(acrylic acid) (PAA) and poly(ethylene imine) (PEI), with the latter being either pure PEI or silver nanoparticles coated with PEI (Ag-PEI). The coatings were further functionalized by grafting of polymer brushes, using either hydrophilic poly(sulfobetaine) or low surface energy poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS). The presence of both LBL films and sulfobetaine polymer brushes at the interface significantly increased the hydrophilicity of the membrane surface, while PDMS brushes lowered the membrane surface energy. Overall, all surface modifications resulted in significant reduction of irreversible bacterial cell adhesion. In microbial adhesion tests with E. coli bacteria, a normalized cell adhesion in the range of only 4 to 16% on the modified membrane surfaces was observed. Modified surfaces containing silver nanoparticles also exhibited strong antimicrobial activity. Membranes coated with LBL films of PAA/Ag-PEI achieved over 95% inactivation of bacteria attached to the surface within 1 hour of contact time. Both the antifouling and antimicrobial results suggest the potential of using these novel surface coatings in controlling the fouling of RO membranes. © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2014.
AB - Thin-film composite (TFC) polyamide reverse osmosis (RO) membranes are prone to biofouling due to their inherent physicochemical surface properties. In order to address the biofouling problem, we have developed novel surface coatings functionalized with biocidal silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) and antifouling polymer brushes via polyelectrolyte layer-by-layer (LBL) self-assembly. The novel surface coating was prepared with polyelectrolyte LBL films containing poly(acrylic acid) (PAA) and poly(ethylene imine) (PEI), with the latter being either pure PEI or silver nanoparticles coated with PEI (Ag-PEI). The coatings were further functionalized by grafting of polymer brushes, using either hydrophilic poly(sulfobetaine) or low surface energy poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS). The presence of both LBL films and sulfobetaine polymer brushes at the interface significantly increased the hydrophilicity of the membrane surface, while PDMS brushes lowered the membrane surface energy. Overall, all surface modifications resulted in significant reduction of irreversible bacterial cell adhesion. In microbial adhesion tests with E. coli bacteria, a normalized cell adhesion in the range of only 4 to 16% on the modified membrane surfaces was observed. Modified surfaces containing silver nanoparticles also exhibited strong antimicrobial activity. Membranes coated with LBL films of PAA/Ag-PEI achieved over 95% inactivation of bacteria attached to the surface within 1 hour of contact time. Both the antifouling and antimicrobial results suggest the potential of using these novel surface coatings in controlling the fouling of RO membranes. © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2014.
UR - http://hdl.handle.net/10754/597854
UR - http://xlink.rsc.org/?DOI=c3tb21681k
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84894700402&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1039/c3tb21681k
DO - 10.1039/c3tb21681k
M3 - Article
SN - 2050-750X
VL - 2
SP - 1724
JO - Journal of Materials Chemistry B
JF - Journal of Materials Chemistry B
IS - 12
ER -