Characterization Effect of Polysulfone Membranes with Different Molecular Weight of Polyethylene Glycol Additives

Abstract

Nowadays, membrane technology has gaining popularity in biotechnology, food processing, water treatment, pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries. It been reported as a potential technique for separation due to their low-cost process, does not used many chemical and energy sufficient. However, there is less study about polysulfone (PSF) used as a polymer based in membrane filtration with polyethylene glycol (PEG) as additives in different molecular weight (Mw: 400, 600, 1500, and 4000 Da). Therefore, this study has been conducted to investigate the effect of different molecular weight of PEG in terms of thermal stability, hydrophilicity, and porosity. For methodology, PSF polymer was fabricated with PEG and Dimethylacetamide (DMAc) act as solvent via wet phase inversion method. The physical, thermal and chemical characterization were analysed using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and laboratory testing of contact angle, water uptake, and porosity. The result showed improvement in fabricated membranes hydrophilicity than pure membrane. PEG with high molecular weight demonstrated the higher membrane hydrophilicity, good thermal stability (38.40%), contact angle (54°), higher water uptake (385.23%), and higher porosity (82.72%). As conclusion, PSF with addition of the high molecular weight of PEG (PEG4000) can improve the performance of membrane filtration.