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Updated: Jul 8, 2026

Three-Dimensionally Printed Microfluidic Cross-flow System for Ultrafiltration/Nanofiltration Membrane Performance Testing
Published on: February 13, 2016
Irreversible fouling during multicycle microfiltration of wastewater effluent
Huifeng Shan1, Ronald D Neufeld
1Environmental Engineering and Science, Clemson University, Clemson, South Carolina, USA.
Abstract:
This study focused on irreversible fouling during microfiltration of primary and secondary effluents from municipal wastewater treatment plants. Flow resistances were calculated from the sum of clean membrane resistances, resultant cake layer resistances, and consequent irreversible fouling resistances. Results from a dead-end cell experimental system showed that the accumulated cake resistance was dominating for microfiltration of primary/secondary effluents. Suspended solids in the primary and secondary effluents had a similar compressibility index, n, with a value of approximately 0.5, indicating that they were moderately compressible particles. The value of irreversible resistance is dependent on the intensity of membrane cleaning; however, for a given membrane cleaning strategy, this value steadily increased and reached a maximum after approximately 6 cycles of filtration and cleaning. This study provided an explanation for the significant drop of throughput flux in the early application of membrane processes, and a plateau flux approached correspondingly.
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