Surface chemical modification of a polysulfone membrane

Chemical grafting has been employed to introduce hydrophilic groups onto a polysulfone membrane, in an attempt to improve its hydrophilicity and anti-fouling capability. Acrylamide graft copolymerization was initiated by Ce4+/OH-on the membrane surface after pre-treatment with K2S2O8. XPS and ATR-FTIR analysis showed that acrylamide (AAm) was successfully grafted onto the PSF membrane surface, and the surface morphology of the membrane after grafting was visualized by SEM. The effects of varying the pre-treatment temperature, pre-treatment time and grafting reaction temperature on the grafting reaction were also studied. For a pre-treatment temperature of 40 ℃, pre-treatment time of 2 h, and grafting reaction temperature of 40 ℃, the water contact angle of the grafted membrane surface can be reduced to about 29°. The results showed that this method could be effectively used to improve the hydrophilicity of the polysulfone membrane.