TY - JOUR
T1 - Highly flexible monolayered porous membrane with superhydrophilicity-hydrophilicity for unidirectional liquid penetration
AU - Zhang, Qiuya
AU - Li, Yan
AU - Yan, Yufeng
AU - Zhang, Xiaofang
AU - Tian, Dongliang
AU - Jiang, Lei
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors are grateful for financial support from the Chinese National Natural Science Foundation (21671012, 21601013) and Beijing Natural Science Foundation (2172033).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 American Chemical Society.
PY - 2020/6/2
Y1 - 2020/6/2
N2 - The ability to allow microliquid to penetrate in one direction but block in the opposite direction plays an irreplaceable role in intelligent liquid management. Despite much progress toward facilitating directional transport by multilayer porous membranes with opposite wettability, it remains difficult to achieve a highly multifunctional flexible membrane for highly efficient unidirectional liquid transport in different situations. Herein, a superhydrophilic-hydrophilic self-supported monolayered porous poly(ether sulfone) (PES) membrane with special nano- and micropores at opposite surfaces is demonstrated, which can be used for unidirectional liquid transport. The results reveal that the competition of liquid spreading and permeation is critical to achieve directional liquid transport. The porous PES membrane, transformed with 70 vol % of ethanol in water (E/W-PES-70%), exhibits continuous unidirectional liquid penetration and antigravity unidirectional ascendant in a large range of pH values and can be used as "liquid diode"for moisture wicking. Moreover, the PES membrane can be prepared in a large area with excellent flexibility at room and liquid nitrogen temperature, indicating great promise in harsh environments. This work will provide an avenue for designing porous materials and smart dehumidification materials, which have promising applications in biomedical materials, advanced functional textiles, engineered desiccant materials, etc.
AB - The ability to allow microliquid to penetrate in one direction but block in the opposite direction plays an irreplaceable role in intelligent liquid management. Despite much progress toward facilitating directional transport by multilayer porous membranes with opposite wettability, it remains difficult to achieve a highly multifunctional flexible membrane for highly efficient unidirectional liquid transport in different situations. Herein, a superhydrophilic-hydrophilic self-supported monolayered porous poly(ether sulfone) (PES) membrane with special nano- and micropores at opposite surfaces is demonstrated, which can be used for unidirectional liquid transport. The results reveal that the competition of liquid spreading and permeation is critical to achieve directional liquid transport. The porous PES membrane, transformed with 70 vol % of ethanol in water (E/W-PES-70%), exhibits continuous unidirectional liquid penetration and antigravity unidirectional ascendant in a large range of pH values and can be used as "liquid diode"for moisture wicking. Moreover, the PES membrane can be prepared in a large area with excellent flexibility at room and liquid nitrogen temperature, indicating great promise in harsh environments. This work will provide an avenue for designing porous materials and smart dehumidification materials, which have promising applications in biomedical materials, advanced functional textiles, engineered desiccant materials, etc.
KW - highly flexible
KW - monolayered
KW - porous material
KW - superhydrophilicity-hydrophilicity
KW - unidirectional liquid penetration
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85087097047&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1021/acsnano.0c02558
DO - 10.1021/acsnano.0c02558
M3 - Article
C2 - 32484656
AN - SCOPUS:85087097047
VL - 14
SP - 7287
EP - 7296
JO - ACS Nano
JF - ACS Nano
SN - 1936-0851
IS - 6
ER -