Preparation and Characterization of the Modified Polyvinylidene Fluoride (PVDF) Hollow Fibre Microfiltration Membrane

A novel thermally induced graft polymerization technique was used to modify a polyvinylidene fluoride （PVDF） hollow fibre microfiltration membrane. An artificial neural network （ANN） was applied to optimize the prepared condition of the membrane. The optimized dosing of acrylic acid （AA）, acrylamide （AM）, N, N＇- methylenebisacrylamide （NMBA） and potassium persulphate （KSP） designed by ANN was that AA was 40.63 ml/L; AM acted as 6.25 g/L; NMBA was 1.72 g/L and KSP was 1.5 g/L, respectively. The thermal stability of the PVDF modified hollow fibre membrane （PVDF-PAA） was investigated by thermogravimetric （TG） and differential scanning calorimetry （DSC） analysis. The polycrystallinity of the PVDF-PAA membrane was evaluated by X-ray diffraction （XRD） analysis. The complex formation of the modified membrane was ascertained by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy （FTIR）. The morphology of the PVDF-PAA membrane was studied by environmental scanning electron microscopy （ESEM）. The surface compositions of the membrane were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy （XPS）. The adsorption capacity of Cu^2＋ ion on the PVDF-PAA hollow fibre membrane was also investigated.

Preparation and properties of hollow fibre nanofiltration membrane with continuous coffee-ring structure

Polyamide(PA)hollow fibre composite nanofiltration(NF)membranes with a coffee-ring structure and beneficial properties were prepared by adding graphene oxide(GO)into the interfacial polymerization process.The presentation of the coffee-ring structure was attributed to the heterogeneous,finely dispersed multiphase reaction system and the“coffee-stain”effect of the GO solution.When the piperazine concentration was 0.4 wt-%,the trimesoyl chloride concentration was 0.3 wt-%,and the GO concentration was 0.025 wt-%,the prepared NF membranes showed the best separation properties.The permeate flux was 76 L·m^(−2)·h^(−1),and the rejection rate for MgSO4 was 98.6%at 0.4 MPa.Scanning electron microscopy,atomic force microscopy,and attenuated total reflectance-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy were used to characterize the chemical structure and morphology of the PA/GO NF membrane.The results showed that GO was successfully entrapped into the PA functional layer.Under neutral operating conditions,the PA/GO membrane showed typical negatively charged NF membrane separation characteristics,and the rejection rate decreased in the order of Na2SO_(4)>MgSO_(4)>MgCl_(2)>NaCl.The PA/GO NF membrane showed better antifouling performance than the PA membrane.

Fully automated sample treatment method for high throughput proteome analysis

The bottom-up strategy for proteome analysis typically employs a multistep sample preparation workflow that suffers from being time-consuming and sample loss or contamination caused by the off-line manual operation.Herein,we developed a hollow fibre membrane(HFM)-aided fully automated sample treatment(FAST)method.Due to the confinement effects of HFMs and the immobilized enzymatic reactor,the proteome samples could be denatured,reduced,desalted and digested within 8–20 min via the one-stop service.This method also showed superiority in trace sample analysis.In one and half hours,we could identify about 1,600 protein groups for 500 HeLa cells as the starting materials,1.5–8 times more than those obtained by previously reported methods.Through the on-line combination of FAST with nano-liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry(nanoLC-ESI-MS/MS),we further established a fully integrated platform for label-free quantification of proteome with high reproducibility and precision.Collectively,FAST presented here represents a major advance in the high throughput sample treatment and quantitative analysis of proteomes.