Preparation of Carbon Membranes

The present work is the first attempt to develop the methods of preparation of carbon membrane catalysts with metal nanoparticles in a carbon membrane matrix. 

PPESK can serve as a polymeric precursor for the preparation of carbon membranes. The weight loss of the PPESK precursor is about 43.0% at to 800°C p5n olysis temperature. 

Salleh WNW, Ismail AF, Matsuura T, Abdullah MS. Precursor selection and process conditions in the preparation of carbon membrane for gas separation A review. Sep PurifRev 2011 40 261-311. 

A suitable polymer material for preparation of carbon membranes should not cause pore holes or any defects after the carbonization. Up to now, various precursor materials such as polyimide, polyacrylonitrile (PAN), poly(phthalazinone ether sulfone ketone) and poly(phenylene oxide) have been used for the fabrication of carbon molecular sieve membranes. Likewise, aromatic polyimide and its derivatives have been extensively used as precursor for carbon membranes due to their rigid structure and high carbon yields. The membrane morphology of polyimide could be well maintained during the high temperature carbonization process. A commercially available and cheap polymeric material is cellulose acetate (CA, MW 100 000, DS = 2.45) this was also used as the precursor material for preparation of carbon membranes by He et al They reported that cellulose acetate can be easily dissolved in many solvents to form the dope solution for spinning the hollow fibers, and the hollow fiber carbon membranes prepared showed good separation performances. 

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