Mesoporous Silica Thin Membranes with Large Vertical Mesochannels for Nanosize-Based Separation

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Nanotechnology
• Chemical Engineering

Background:

• Membrane separation technologies are crucial for industrial processes like water purification and gas separation.
• Current commercial membranes suffer from broad pore size distributions, limiting their separation precision.
• Developing membranes with well-defined pore structures is essential for advanced separation applications.

Purpose of the Study:

• To synthesize mesoporous silica thin membranes with uniform and large vertical mesochannels.
• To evaluate the performance of these membranes in separating nanoparticles and proteins.
• To establish a scalable method for producing high-performance separation membranes.

Main Methods:

• A biphase stratification growth method was employed for membrane synthesis.
• Membrane properties such as thickness, surface area, and pore size were characterized.
• Separation efficiency was tested using gold nanoparticles and proteins of varying sizes.

Main Results:

• Mesoporous silica thin membranes with centimeter-scale intact structures and ultrathin thickness (≤50 nm) were successfully synthesized.
• High surface areas (up to 1420 m² g⁻¹) and tunable pore sizes (≈2.8–11.8 nm) were achieved.
• Excellent separation performances for gold nanoparticles (>91.8%) and proteins (>93.1%) were demonstrated due to uniform pore channels.

Conclusions:

• The developed mesoporous silica membranes exhibit well-defined pore structures and excellent separation capabilities.
• This synthesis method offers a promising route for fabricating advanced membranes for precise nanosize-based separations.
• The findings pave the way for developing new industrial separation processes with enhanced efficiency and selectivity.