Molecular Dynamics Investigation of Ion Sorption and Permeation in Desalination Membranes

With the purpose of gaining insights into the mechanisms of ion uptake and permeation in desalination membranes, MD investigation of a model polyamide membrane was carried out. A relatively large membrane (45K atoms) was assembled, which closely matched real desalination membrane in terms of chemistry and water permeability. Simulations demonstrate that the mechanism of ion uptake distinctly differs from mean-field approaches assuming a smeared excluding Donnan potential. Ion sorption on charged sites in the membrane phase appears to be highly localized, due to electrostatic forces dominating over translational entropy. Moreover, sorption on partial atomic charges becomes possible as well, which greatly enhances salt (co-ion) uptake and weakens the effect of fixed charges on salt exclusion. This could explain high ion uptake measured in polyamide membranes for both co- and counterions and variations of ion sorption and permeation at low salt concentrations. On the other hand, present simulations greatly overestimate ion permeability, which could be explained by a more open structure than in real membranes, in which dense polyamide fragments may efficiently block ion permeation. Unfortunately, MD cannot analyze ion uptake and permeation in dense fragments containing too few ions, which calls for new approaches to studying barrier properties of polyamide

Molecular Dynamics Investigation of Ion Sorption and Permeation in Desalination Membranes

With the purpose of gaining insights into the mechanisms of ion uptake and permeation in desalination membranes, MD investigation of a model polyamide membrane was carried out. A relatively large membrane (45K atoms) was assembled, which closely matched real desalination membrane in terms of chemistry and water permeability. Simulations demonstrate that the mechanism of ion uptake distinctly differs from mean-field approaches assuming a smeared excluding Donnan potential. Ion sorption on charged sites in the membrane phase appears to be highly localized, due to electrostatic forces dominating over translational entropy. Moreover, sorption on partial atomic charges becomes possible as well, which greatly enhances salt (co-ion) uptake and weakens the effect of fixed charges on salt exclusion. This could explain high ion uptake measured in polyamide membranes for both co- and counterions and variations of ion sorption and permeation at low salt concentrations. On the other hand, present simulations greatly overestimate ion permeability, which could be explained by a more open structure than in real membranes, in which dense polyamide fragments may efficiently block ion permeation. Unfortunately, MD cannot analyze ion uptake and permeation in dense fragments containing too few ions, which calls for new approaches to studying barrier properties of polyamide

Molecular Dynamics Investigation of Ion Sorption and Permeation in Desalination Membranes

With the purpose of gaining insights into the mechanisms of ion uptake and permeation in desalination membranes, MD investigation of a model polyamide membrane was carried out. A relatively large membrane (45K atoms) was assembled, which closely matched real desalination membrane in terms of chemistry and water permeability. Simulations demonstrate that the mechanism of ion uptake distinctly differs from mean-field approaches assuming a smeared excluding Donnan potential. Ion sorption on charged sites in the membrane phase appears to be highly localized, due to electrostatic forces dominating over translational entropy. Moreover, sorption on partial atomic charges becomes possible as well, which greatly enhances salt (co-ion) uptake and weakens the effect of fixed charges on salt exclusion. This could explain high ion uptake measured in polyamide membranes for both co- and counterions and variations of ion sorption and permeation at low salt concentrations. On the other hand, present simulations greatly overestimate ion permeability, which could be explained by a more open structure than in real membranes, in which dense polyamide fragments may efficiently block ion permeation. Unfortunately, MD cannot analyze ion uptake and permeation in dense fragments containing too few ions, which calls for new approaches to studying barrier properties of polyamide

Does Hindered Transport Theory Apply to Desalination Membranes?

As reverse osmosis (RO) and nanofiltration polyamide membranes become increasingly used for water purification, prediction of pollutant transport is required for membrane development and process engineering. Many popular models use hindered transport theory (HTT), which considers a spherical solute moving through an array of fluid-filled rigid cylindrical pores. Experiments and molecular dynamic simulations, however, reveal that polyamide membranes have a distinctly different structure of a “molecular sponge”, a network of randomly connected voids widely distributed in size. In view of this disagreement, this study critically examined the validity of HTT by directly measuring diffusivities of several alcohols within a polyamide film of commercial RO membrane using attenuated total reflection–FTIR. It is found that measured diffusivities deviate from HTT predictions by as much as 2–3 orders of magnitude. This result indicates that HTT does not adequately describe solute transport in desalination membranes. As a more adequate alternative, the concept of random resistor networks is suggested, with resistances described by models of activated transport in “soft” polymers without a sharp size cutoff and with a proper address of solute partitioning