Self-assembled functional membranes for filtration and photocatalytic water treatment
Objective
To fabricate nanoporous ultrafiltration membranes exhibiting unprecedented size selectivity coupled with catalytic capability
Technical Approach
Integration of block copolymer (BCP) self-assembly, atomic layer deposition (ALD), and sequential infiltration synthesis (SIS) to prepare uniform, optically active doped titanium dioxide membranes
Accomplishments
- Prepared oriented BCP films and executed SIS/etching to transform them into porous TiO₂
- Verified anatase crystallinity of TiO₂
- Materials
- Performed TiO₂
- ALD on commercial membranes and successfully N-doped the titania to shift its absorption into the visible range
Next Steps
Testing of membrane performance for both physical size filtration and catalytic degradation of model molecules
Impact:
- Paper published on new insight into SIS mechanism: Chem. Mater. 26 (2014) 6135 Accepted (DOI: 10.1021/cm502427q)
- Established new nitrogen-doping ALD process for TiO₂
- materials
- First report of nanoporous TiO₂
- films using the BCP/SIS technique