Sodium alginate/alumina composite biomembrane preparation and performance in DMFC application

Abstract The potential of alumina has been studied as nanofiller in proton exchange membrane (PEM) based sodium alginate biopolymer as the matrix phase. The fabricated membrane improved much better than pure sodium alginate membrane in terms of water uptake, ion exchange capacity, methanol permeability, proton conductivity and oxidative stability results. The well connection between matrix and filler leads in excellent performance by the composite which has good new properties. The best membrane (SAL3) performed highest proton conductivity of 25.6 × 10−3 S cm−1 at 60 °C temperature. The determination on proper amount of nanofiller has result in enhancement of performance such as the conductivity and methanol permeability. Fortunately, the weakness of sodium alginate that so hydrophilic also being covered properly in the presence of alumina which leads in good liquid uptake capacity and swelling ratio. The FESEM, FTIR, XRD, TGA/DSC and mechanical strength analysis has been implemented in order to study the characteristics of the SA/Alumina nanocomposite biomembrane.