(224o) Antimicrobial and Anti-Adhesion Coating for Water Filtration Membrane

Hiu Pang Yu¹, Hao CHEN^1,3, King Lun Yeung^1,2,*

¹Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, ²Division of Environment,  ³Nano Science and Technology Program, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, P.R. China

*Corresponding author: kekyeung@ust.hk

Division: 09 Environmental Division

Subdivision: 09001

Format: Poster

Abstract:

     Water treatment by membrane filtration is one of the most reliable treatment process in water purification. However, microbial biofouling is one of the major obstacle for high permeability and high purity over a long-time operation. Microbial biofouling on the water filtration membrane is a main risk of public health because of the recontamination by pathogenic bacteria, viruses and fungi in the biofouling.

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 This works provide a solution to microbes growing by developing a anti-microbial and anti-adhesion coating which can reduce bacteria survive in filtration setup and prevent adhesion of microbes.

Quaternary ammonium cation is known to have a good bactericidal ability and zwitterionic compound is a good surfactant for anti-adhesion. Here 2-(diethylamino)ethylmethacrylate and [3-(methacryloylamino)propyl] dimethyl(3-sulfopropyl)ammonium hydroxide inner salt were used as antimicrobial and anti-adhesion agents, respectively. Poly (ethylene glycol) diacrylate (PEGDA) was chosen to form a strong cross-linked copolymer coating with the antimicrobial and anti-adhesion agents on the water filtration membrane. The membrane with antimicrobial and anti-adhesion coating is challenged with a high concentration of E.coli in water. High disinfection ability was obtained in liquid disinfection test. The coating was characterized by FTIR and XPS elementary analysis. SEM was applied for biofouling observation. The result shows that structure of the water filter membrane is beneficial to the biofilm formation, and the membrane with anti-adhesion coating can reduce the biofouling by the charged surface from zwitterionic polymer coating