Amphiphilic PVDF-g-PDMAPMA ultrafiltration membrane with enhanced hydrophilicity and antifouling properties

It is easy to adsorb the pollutants from water owning to the hydrophobicity of the poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) ultrafiltration (UF) membrane. To improve the hydrophilicity of the PVDF UF membrane, a novel amphiphilic copolymer PVDF-g-poly-N-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)methacrylamide] (PDMAPMA) was developed. The amphiphilic PVDF-g-PDMAPMA was synthesized with PVDF and N-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)methacrylamide (DMAPMA) via free-radical polymerization, and characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and ¹H nuclear magnetic resonance. The scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy were used to characterize the structure morphologies and elementals of the blend PVDF membranes, respectively. The pure water flux (PWF), molecular weight cutoff, and bovine serum albumin (BSA) solution filtration experiments were tested to evaluate the permeation performance and antifouling properties of the membranes. The experimental results showed that the PWF was 263.1 L m⁻² h⁻¹, BSA rejection rate was 98.1% and flux recovery rate was 95.1% of the prepared blend membrane which had obvious improvement compared with the pristine PVDF membrane (17.3 L m⁻² h⁻¹, 91.0, and 83.8%, respectively). The antibacterial activity test showed the prepared blend membrane had good potency against microorganisms. A novel hydrophilic PVDF membrane with good antibacterial properties was developed and would be promising for wastewater treatment. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136, 48049.