YSZ-Reinforced Alumina Multi-Channel Capillary Membranes for Micro-Filtration

The combined phase-inversion and sintering method not only produces ceramic hollow fibre membranes with much lower fabrication costs than conventional methods, but these membranes can also be designed to have greatly reduced transport resistances for filtration processes. The bottleneck of this technique is the weak mechanical property of the fibres, due to the small dimensions and the brittle nature of the ceramic materials. In this study, yttrium stabilised zirconia (YSZ) reinforced alumina seven-channel capillary microfiltration membranes were prepared with a pore size of ~230 nm and their mechanical property and permeation characteristics were studied. It is found that the addition of YSZ can effectively enhance the mechanical property of the membrane and also increase pure water permeation flux. The Al₂O₃-YSZ seven-channel capillary membranes could reach a fracture load of 23.4 N and a bending extension of 0.54 mm when being tested with a 6 cm span, to meet the requirements for most industrial microfiltration applications.