(191bk) Chiral Membranes for Enantiomer Separation

Most essential substances of living organisms are chiral in nature. Recently, enantiomeric separation of racemic mixtures has developed rapidly to meet the needs of the biotechnology, materials, agrochemicals, fragrances and pharmaceutical industries. Chiral membrane filtration is a faster, more efficient, less energy-intensive, easier to scale up and broadly applicable technique than crystallization and chromatography. An approach for separating enantiomers using modified regenerated cellulose membrane is presented. This novel method of coating membranes is useful recovering the desirable enantiomer of important drugs like propranolol, thalidomide, carnitine and methotrexate. A high selectivity towards a particular enantiomer was achieved after coating the membranes with a chiral and structural polymer. The membranes were characterized using Attenuated Total Reflectance Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy and X-Ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy and Scanning Electron Microscopy. To determine selectivity and permeability, the membranes were evaluated via filtration of chiral feed streams containing amino acids and/or proteins with selectivities evaluated via LC-MS.