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Updated: Jun 13, 2025
Electrophoretic Crystallization of Ultrathin High-performance Metal-organic Framework Membranes
Published on: August 16, 2018
Synergistic Tuning of Microstructure and Morphology in Carbon Molecular Sieve Hollow Fibers for Propylene/Propane
Zhongyun Liu1, Yuhe Cao1, William J Koros1
1School of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 311 Ferst Drive, 30332, Atlanta, GA, USA.
Abstract:
Asymmetric carbon molecular sieve (CMS) hollow fiber membranes with tunable micro- and macro-structural morphologies for energy efficient propylene-propane separation are reported here. A sub-glass transition temperature (sub-Tg) thermal oxidative crosslinking strategy enables simultaneous optimization of the intrinsic molecular sieving properties while also reducing the thickness of the CMS "skin" derived from the 6FDA : BPDA/DAM polyimide precursors. Such synergistic tuning of CMS microstructure and macroscopic morphology of CMS hollow fibers enables significantly increased propylene permeance (reaching 186.5 GPU) while maintaining an appealing propylene/propane selectivity of 13.3 for 50/50 propylene/propane mixed gas feeds. Our findings reveal a more refined and versatile tool than available with previous O2-doping pretreatments. The advanced approach here should be broadly useful to other polyimide precursors and diverse gas pairs.
