effect of poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) with different molecular weights on microstructure and nanofilteration performance of polyacrylonitrile membrane

In this study, the effect of addition of poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) (pvp) with different molecular weights (25000 and 40000 g/mol) during the preparation of polyacrylonitrile (pan) membranes is studied morphology, permeated water flux (pwf) and fouling behavior of the prepared membranes were compared with and without pvp addition by addition of pvp into the pan casting solutions, systems revealed different membrane morphologies the membrane casted from a mixture contained pvp with lower molecular weight had better anti-fouling properties chemical changes in membrane were characterized via fourier transform infrared spectroscopy/attenuated total reflectance (ftir/atr), and scanning electron microscopy (sem) in addition, contact angle (ca), hydrophilicity degree and performance of modified membranes, were also investigated it was found that the top layer of the membrane and the suppression of macrovoid formation strongly depend on the molecular weight of pvp