Researchers Use A New Desalination Membrane To Make Seawater Drinkable

According to Professor MATSUYAMA Hideto at Kobe University, their team has created anovelseawater desalination membrane. The researchers developed the membrane by laminating 2D carbon material on a porous polymer membrane surface. The urgent need for desalinated membranes is to start using seawater as well. This newly developed membrane has the potential to produce fresh water from seawater. The new study is projected to solve global freshwater water insufficiency. The current goal is to create a desalination membrane with salt removal, faster water permeability, less energy intensity, and more effectiveness. The researchers formed a 50nm desalination membrane by stacking up 2Dgraphene oxide nanosheets onto a porous membrane after a chemical reduction treatment.

The newly developed membrane has great control over the gaps present in between the nanosheets of graphene oxideor the charges on the sheets thereby contributing to highly efficient desalination process. The latest study is anticipated to encourage wide range application and use of futuristic desalination membranes. The stability of the nanosheet-laminated membrane is anticipated to help manipulate the layers so as to achieve the desired output. Further, addition of porphyrin-based planar molecules between the nanosheets helped control the anion movements in the nanochannels. Interestingly, it was confirmed that the study helped reject sodium chloride (NaCl) permeation; thereby leading to the development of high performance membrane technologies.

As only 2.5% on the Earth is freshwater and the rest 97.5% of the water on Earth is seawater, the researchers have decided to desalinate seawater to add up to the 0.01% of freshwater resources that is easily treated in order to be utilized by humankind. The desalination membranes are the most preferred compared to the evaporation methods that require high amount of energy. Additionally, the growing human population is a huge concern as meeting their demands seems to be a cumbersome task. The water insufficiency has lately forced the researchers to start desalinating seawater. It is also being predicted that the humankind is going to face severe water shortage issues in the next few years.