Synthesis of Catalytic Nanoporous Metallic Thin Films on Polymer Membranes

This work deals with the creation of bimetallic thin films on porous polymer membrane surfaces. Metal–polymer composite membranes have been produced through magnetron sputtering. Commercially available membranes with both micrometer and nanometer scale pores were used as supports for deposition. Continuous alloy films of ∼110 nm thickness were deposited to produce the top layer of the composite structure. These films were dealloyed with sulfuric acid creating a nanoporous film structure with a ligament size of 7.7 ± 2.5 nm. The resulting composite membranes were permeable to water at all stages of production, and an polysulfone ultrafiltration membrane with 90 nm of nanoporous Fe/Pd on top showed a flux of 183 L/m2/h (LMH)/bar. The films were evaluated for dechlorination of toxic polychlorinated biphenyls from water. At a loading of 6.6 mg/L Pd attached to 13.2 cm2 support in a 2.5 ppm PCB-1 solution with 1.5 ppm dissolved H2, over 90% of PCB-1 was removed from solution in 30 min, which produced the expec...