Membranes have wide uses in industry and medicine applications. Polymer membranes are important materials because of their high chemical resistance, but they are of weak mechanical resistance against high pressures. Therefore, it was essential to modify a permeability measuring technique free from high pressure application. The current work represented a modification for the permeability measuring technique of membranes, where ionic salt was added with known concentration to water as common solvent and the electrolyte current was measured behind the membrane. The electrolysis current was correlated to the flow rate of water across a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) membrane. Some other problems were raised such that polarization on electrodes and changes in electrolyte contents during the long time of the slow process. Pulsed potential on electrodes resolved these problems and other associated problems like rush in current and the double layer capacitance effect. An empirical equation was suggested to evaluate the permeability of polymer membranes by this modified method. Easy and accurate measurement of permeability helped authors to change the permeability of PVA membranes by adding copper nano particles in membrane to reduce its permeability, and adding silicone dioxide micro particles to the PVA membranes to increase its permeability. Authors suggested a mechanism for these permeability changes. Scanning electron microscope images for the filled PVA membranes supported the suggested mechanism.
@artical{m452015ijsea04051016,
Title = "New Technique for Measuring and Controlling the Permeability of Polymeric Membranes",
Journal ="International Journal of Science and Engineering Applications (IJSEA)",
Volume = "4",
Issue ="5",
Pages ="314 - 326",
Year = "2015",
Authors ="M. M. El-Tonsy, I. M. Fouda, M. A. Farid, "}