A study on the microfiltration behavior of self-supporting electrospun nanofibrous membrane in water using an optical particle counter

The present study deals with the electrospinning preparation of a self-supporting nanofibrous membrane to be used for particle separation applications especially from aqueous media. Electrospun PAN nanofibrous mat with average fiber diameter of 165 +/- 16 nm was prepared and employed as a membrane material for water filtration due to its high chemical and thermal stabilities and good wetability with water. The results obtained from SEM observations and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) technique indicated that the porosity of 91.7% and specific surface area near 40 m(2) g(-1) along with open pores in the diameter range of less than 2 mu m, have provided high permeability and low pressure drop, high dirt-loading capacity and an ability to retain small particles for the nanofibrous membrane. The membrane exhibited high water permeability and mechanical strength as a result of having high level of consistency with minimum number of structural defects. The evaluation of filtration behavior of the membrane with an aid of an optical particle counter proved that the membrane has high ability to remove more than 90% of microparticles in the range of 1-20 mu m from water and possesses high quality factor. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.