Crosslinked chitosan-modified ultrafiltration membranes for efficient surface water treatment and enhanced anti-fouling performances

Qi Qiu; Feng Xu; Weiwei Zhou; Xiaojuan Zhao; Yunwei Li; Hongbo Gao; Shaofang Sun; Hanyun Li; Xuewu Zhu; Daoji Wu

doi:10.1515/gps-2024-0115

Article Open Access

Crosslinked chitosan-modified ultrafiltration membranes for efficient surface water treatment and enhanced anti-fouling performances

Qi Qiu , Feng Xu , Weiwei Zhou , Xiaojuan Zhao , Yunwei Li , Hongbo Gao , Shaofang Sun , Hanyun Li , Xuewu Zhu and Daoji Wu

Published/Copyright: December 2, 2024

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From the journal Green Processing and Synthesis Volume 13 Issue 1

Graphic abstract

Abstract

To overcome the shortcomings of traditional water treatment technology, ultrafiltration (UF) technology has become a widely used process in the advanced treatment of drinking water, but the existing process has low flux, surface hydrophobicity, easy compaction and other shortcomings. In this study, green chitosan (CS) crosslinking modified UF membrane strategy is adopted to improve its anti-fouling and sustainable reuse in water treatment applications. In addition, modified UF achieved much better separation performances in treating natural surface water. By regulating the crosslinking reaction between CS and glutaraldehyde (GA), modified membranes with different concentrations of CS were prepared, and their structures and chemical properties were characterized. Humic acid was used as the model foulant to study the antifouling behaviors of the CS-coated UF membrane, and the anti-fouling mechanism was analyzed the crosslinking modification strategy of CS-GA provides a new way to alleviate the pollution of UF membrane.

Keywords: chitosan; ultrafiltration membrane; surface water; natural organic matter; anti-fouling performance

1 Introduction

The trend of drinking water pollution in China is not optimistic, and the potential for pollution of urban drinking water sources and supply systems still exists [1]. At present, most urban water plants in China generally use conventional treatment processes such as, sedimentation, sand filtration, and disinfection to produce drinking water with low turbidity and high safety [2,3,4]. The source water for drinking water treatment plants is mostly taken from natural surface water such as rivers, lakes, and reservoirs [5,6]. The conventional treatment of drinking water is not effective in removing a wide range of contaminants [7,8,9]. On the other hand, as the standard of living rises, public demand for the quality of drinking water is also rising, which obviously increases the difficulty and complexity of drinking water treatment [10,11,12].

The membrane filtration (microfiltration, ultrafiltration [UF], nanofiltration, and reverse osmosis) technology for urban water plants has made rapid development in order to solve the problem of drinking water biosafety and to make up for the shortcomings of the first- and second-generation water treatment processes [13,14,15,16,17]. Reverse osmosis membranes, nanofiltration membranes, and UF membranes with pore sizes smaller than 0.02 µm can retain all microorganisms, algae, and other suspended particles in water, including viruses, bacteria, and protozoa, making them the most effective technology for ensuring drinking water safety [18]. Since nanofiltration and reverse osmosis belong to high-pressure membrane filtration technologies, the treatment processes are relatively complex, and the operational energy consumption and investment costs are relatively high; microfiltration membranes have relatively large pore sizes and cannot remove all pathogenic microorganisms [19,20]. Therefore, UF technology has shown broad application potential in the field of drinking water treatment [21]. UF can not only remove almost all pathogenic microorganisms, suspended particles, and colloidal particles in the water but also partially retain small molecular weight organic pollutants, significantly reducing the use of disinfectants and improving the chemical safety of the water [22,23]. However, the contamination of UF membranes during the water filtration process consistently reduces their lifespan and increases economic burdens. During operation, UF membranes face issues such as membrane fouling and poor removal efficiency of dissolved organic matter [24]. Therefore, to mitigate membrane fouling during UF and effectively enhance UF water purification efficiency, measures are usually taken from three aspects: operating conditions, membrane characteristics, and raw water characteristics [25,26]. Specific measures include optimizing and controlling operating conditions, modifying membrane materials, and pre-treating raw water.

Chitosan (CS) has received widespread attention for its excellent performance in various scientific fields such as food technology, tissue engineering, pharmaceuticals, heavy metal removal, and environmental biotechnology [27,28]. CS is obtained from chitin, which is widely present in the shells of lower animals and plants in nature, such as arthropods (shrimp, crabs), through a deacetylation reaction with alkali and heat [29]. CS can effectively remove harmful substances such as trihalomethanes from tap water, as well as other odorous substances and mutagenic substances [30]. During the adsorption process of harmful substances in drinking water, CS does not remove K⁺, Ca²⁺, Na⁺, Mg²⁺, SO₄ ²⁻, and Cl⁻. It does not affect the background concentration of natural water and has antibacterial effects. Therefore, CS is an ideal adsorbent for the purification of drinking water [31].

This work intended to utilize the hydrophilic properties of CS material under acidic conditions to modify the surface of UF membranes, constructing a CS-modified catalytic membrane system. Focusing on the “efficiency regulation-influencing factors-mechanism of action” as the main line, the study aimed to address two key scientific issues: the degradation and transformation mechanisms of pollutants in the modified membrane system and the reaction mechanisms in the membrane fouling regulation process. This provided theoretical and technical support for the scientific application of this technology in membrane fouling control and the development of membrane water purification processes.

2 Experimental sections

2.1 Materials and chemicals

Isopropanol (IPA, 99.9% purity), humic acid (HA, 99.9% purity), acetic acid (AA, 99.9% purity), CS ( medium viscosity, 200–400 mPaꞏs), glutaraldehyde (GA, AR, 50% w/w), and hydrochloric acid (37% w/w) were obtained from Kermel (Tianjin, China). All chemicals and reagents were dissolved in ultrapure water produced by a water purification system (IQ7500, Milli-Q). The raw natural surface water was taken from Huashan lake (Jinan, China), and pre-treated using 0.45 μm sterilizing filters (Jinlong, China) to remove the suspended solids. The main water qualities are listed as follows: pH = 7.1–7.4, dissolved organic carbon (DOC) = 2.1–3.2 mg·L⁻¹, UV₂₅₄ = 0.015–0.025 cm⁻¹, total dissolved solids (TDS) = 1,138–1,280 μS·cm⁻¹, and turbidity = 2.0–2.9 NTU. The polyethersulfone (PES, UP150) membranes applied in this work were provided by Microdyn-Nadir.

2.2 Fabrication of CS-UFM membranes

The fabrication procedure of CS-coated ultrafiltration membranes (CS-UFM) membranes are listed as follows (Figure 1): The PES membrane was first cut into circles of 7.5 cm diameter and immersed in 30% IPA solution for 10 min, with moderate shaking to remove the chemical protective layer on the surface of the commercial membrane and open the membrane pores sufficiently. After the pretreatment of the PES membrane, the support was placed in the middle of two hollow Plexiglas plates with the active layer facing upwards, and 30 mL of CS solution of different concentrations (0–0.4 wt%, 2 wt% AA as catalyst) was added to the reactor in turn for 3 min, and then the excess CS solution was poured off. After 3 min of contact, pour off the excess CS solution, and then pour 30 mL of GA solution with a concentration of 1.0 wt%, the reaction was carried out for 5 min. The modified membranes were immersed in ultrapure water for characterization, and named as CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.1, CS-UFM0.2, CS-UFM0.3, and CS-UFM0.4, respectively, according to the different CS concentrations.

Figure 1

Schematic illustration of the fabrication process of crosslinked CS-modified UF membranes.

2.3 Characterization of CS-UFM membranes

Scanning electron microscope (SEM, JSM-IT800is, JEOL) and atomic force microscope (AFM, SPM-9700HT, SHIMADZU) were used to obtain the surface morphology and structural composition of the UFM membranes. Fourier infrared (ATR-FTIR, INVENIO, BRUKER) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS, Nexsa, NJ) were applied to characterize the membrane surface, elemental composition, and chemical structure of the membrane surfaces. A contact angle meter (DSA25, KRUSS) was used to characterize the degree of hydrophilicity of the membrane surface. A pH meter (PH700, Apera) and a total organic carbon meter (TOC-L, SHIMADZU) were used to determine the acidity and the DOC, respectively. A three-dimensional fluorescence excitation-emission matrix (EEM) spectrometer (F-7000, HITACHI) was used to measure the content of fluorescent organic matter. Ultraviolet spectrophotometer (UV, UV-1800, MAPADA) was used to measure the UV absorbance value at 254 nm (UV₂₅₄). A high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC, Waters e2695, USA) coupled with an ultraviolet absorption (UVA) detector (Waters 2489, USA) was utilized to analyze the molecular weight of the foulants.

2.4 Separation performance assessment of CS-UFM membranes

A laboratory-assembled stirred filtration system was used to test the filtering performance of UF membranes. Before testing, the membrane was subjected to a 60 min operation using deionized water under 0.5 bar pressure. Subsequently, the water permeance (L·m⁻²·h⁻¹·bar⁻¹) of the UF membrane was measured using ultrapure water at the same temperature and pressure, and was calculated using Eq. 1 [32,33,34,35].

(1) J = V A × t × P

The variables are defined as follows: V and A represent filtration volume (L) and filtration area (m²), and P (bar) and t (h) represent filtration pressure and filtration time, respectively.

The conductivity of salt solutions (Na₂SO₄ and NaCl, 2,000 ppm) was determined by a conductivity meter. Molecular weight cut-off (MWCO) of the membranes was assessed using a PEG solution (200 ppm), and the concentration of PEG (600–2,000 g·mol⁻¹) was measured by a total organic carbon analyzer (TOC). The rejection rate (R) was calculated using Eq. 2 [36,37,38]:

(2) R = 1 − C p C f × 100 %

(3) α = ( C Salt / C Dye ) p ( C Salt / C Dye ) f = 1 − R Salt 1 − R Dye

where C _f and C _p (μS·cm⁻¹ or mg·L⁻¹) represent the concentrations of feed and permeate, respectively.

The average pore size (nm) of the UF membranes were calculated using Eqs. 4 and 5 [39,40].

(4) d s = 33.46 × 10 − 3 × M 0.577

(5) d R ( d p ) d d p = 1 d p ln σ p 2 π exp − ( ln d p − ln μ p ) 2 2 ( ln σ p ) 2

2.5 Anti-fouling evaluation of CS-UFM membranes

The anti-fouling properties of membranes were tested with a mixed solution of HA (100 ppm). The membrane was filtered 6 h under 0.5 bar pressure to stabilize the CS-UFM membrane flux. The filtration pressure during the experiment was maintained at 4 bar. First, deionized water was filtered through the membrane for 100 mL, and the water flux was registered as J₀. Next the mixture solutions were filtered through the membrane for 100 mL, and the flux was registered as J _p. The entire experiment was performed four times. The anti-fouling capability of the CS-UFM membranes was evaluated in terms of flux decay ratio (FDR, %) and flux recovery ratio (FRR, %) using Eqs. 6 and 7.

(6) FRR = J w J 0 × 100 %

(7) FDR = 1 − J p J 0 × 100 %

3 Results and discussion

3.1 Surface morphologies of CS-UFM membranes

SEM and AFM were used to obtain the surface morphology and roughness of the membranes, respectively, and the results are shown in Figure 2a–e, respectively.

Figure 2

Surface morphologies and roughness of crosslinked CS-modified UF membranes: (a) CS-UFM-0; (b) CS-UFM-0.1; (c) CS-UFM-0.2; (d) CS-UFM-0.3; and (e) CS-UFM-0.4.

As shown in Figure 2a, the surface of the CS-UFM0 membrane showed a uniform microporous structure, while during the polymerization of CS and GA, the microporous structure began decreasing with the increasing content of the CS coating and was gradually covered by the CS layer [41]. Furthermore, with the increase in CS coating content to 0.3 wt% and 0.4 wt%, a denser membrane surface structure was observed, indicating the formation of a dense covering layer during the reaction process of high-concentration CS coating with GA. In order to study the change in membrane surface roughness, the 2D and 3D morphology of the membrane surface was measured by AFM.

As shown in Figure 2a–e, the order of surface roughness formed by UF membranes reacting with GA at different CS reaction concentrations was CS-UFM0.4 < CS-UFM0.3 < CS-UFM0.2 < CS-UFM0.1 < CS-UFM0. The surface average roughness of the original CS-UFM0 membrane was highest at Ra 5.7 ± 0.1 nm, and with the increase in CS coating concentration after reaction with GA, a smoother membrane surface structure was formed, leading to a decrease in membrane surface roughness [42]. As shown in Figure 2a–e, compared to the PES membrane, when the CS reaction concentration was 0.1–0.2 wt%, the Ra of the membrane decreased to 4.3 ± 0.1 nm (a decrease of approximately 24.5%), while when the CS reaction concentration was 0.3 and 0.4 wt%, the Ra of the membrane decreased to 3.8 ± 0.1 nm (a decrease of approximately 33.3%). This indicated that the polymerization reaction between CS and GA reduced the surface wrinkled morphology of the membrane, forming a smoother active layer [43]. In addition, the membranes had smoother filtration layers at CS reaction concentrations of 0.3 and 0.4 wt%, which favored the fouling resistance of the UF membranes.

3.2 Surface chemical features of CS-UFM membranes

The FTIR characterization of the prepared UF membranes was carried out in order to characterize the changes in the functional groups on the membrane surface due to the polymerization reaction of CS with GA, and the results are shown in Figure 3a. The broad peak near 3,400–3,200 cm⁻¹ was mainly attributed to the stretching vibration of the N-H bond, indicating that the CS layer was coated on the membrane surface through hydrogen bonding [44]. The characteristic peaks of the CS-UFM membranes appeared at 3,200–3,600, 1,630, and 1,440 cm⁻¹, corresponding to the stretching vibrations of O–H, C═O, and O–H bonds, respectively. XPS was used to evaluate the influence of CS reaction concentration on the surface element composition of UF membranes prepared by CS and GA interface polymerization. As shown in Figure 3b, all UF membranes exhibited three typical characteristic peaks of C, N, and O. Furthermore, the characteristic peak of S element in the UF membranes prepared by interfacial polymerization did not appear in the spectra of the UF membranes, indicating that the interface polymerization reaction between CS and GA did not generate defects [45]. In order to quantitatively analyze the effect of CS reaction concentration on the changes in the content of membrane surface functional groups, the characteristic peaks of the O1s element were deconvoluted into two peaks, corresponding to O–C═O and N–C═O, respectively. As shown in Figure 3c–g, with the increase in CS reaction concentration, the content of O–C═O functional groups in O1s increased from 21.09% to 21.18%, 22.20%, 22.49%, 22.83%, and 24.32%, respectively. The content of N–C═O functional groups in N1s increased from 1.31% to 2.56%, 3.54%, 4.62%, 7.75%, and 17.55%, respectively. This was attributed to the presence of a large number of –OH and –NH₃ functional groups in CS molecules, and with the increase in CS reaction concentration, the cross-linking reaction between GA and CS continuously occurred, resulting in the growth of functional groups on the membrane surface. Therefore, increasing the concentration of CS contributed to the formation of dense polyamide membranes with fewer defects, thereby improving the separation performance.

Figure 3

Chemical features of crosslinked CS-modified UF membranes: (a) ATR-FTIR; (b) XPS; high-resolution O 1 s of (c) CS-UFM-0, (d) CS-UFM-0.1, (e) CS-UFM-0.2, (f) CS-UFM-0.3, and (g) CS-UFM-0.4; (h) contact angles; and (i) zeta potentials.

Hydrophilicity could be characterized by measuring the contact angle, and with the continuous increase in CS reaction concentration, compared with the unmodified PES membrane, the contact angles of CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.1, CS-UFM0.2, CS-UFM0.3, and CS-UFM0.4 membranes after reaction with GA decreased by 0.28°, 3.05°, 6.2°, 8.65°, and 10.86°, respectively (as shown in Figure 3h, indicating that the modified UF membrane had a stronger surface hydrophilicity. As shown in Figure 3i, the zeta potential of the UF membrane under different pH conditions gradually decreased with the increase in CS reaction concentration. Specifically, the zeta potentials of CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.1, CS-UFM0.2, CS-UFM0.3, and CS-UFM0.4 at pH 7.0 were –13.42, –11.45, –11.37, –11.28, and –9.67 mV, respectively. The results of XPS analysis showed that the number of negatively charged -OH groups increased with the increase in CS reaction concentration, consequently, the negative electronegativity of the membrane surface gradually increased when the CS reaction concentration was increased.

3.3 Separation efficiencies of CS-UFM for natural surface water

As shown in Figure 4a, with the increase in coating, the flux of CS-UFM0 decreased from 1173.59 to 1032.33 L·m⁻²·h⁻¹·bar⁻¹ for the CS-UFM0.4 membrane. The increase in coating thickness led to an increase in transmembrane resistance. The various water quality indicators in surface water are characterized in detail in Figure 4b. It was observed that with the increase in CS addition, the maximum removal rates of DOC, UV254, and water turbidity by the modified UF membrane were 20.95%, 8.99%, and 7.62%, respectively, indicating a slight improvement in the removal efficiency of organic matter by the modified UF membrane. This indicated that the modified UF membrane had a relatively weak ability to remove organic matter, insufficient to achieve precise retention [46,47]. As shown in Figure 4c, the modified UF membrane did not exhibit significant removal effects for small and medium molecular weight organic matter with a molecular weight of less than 2,000 Da, but it had a higher removal effect for high molecular weight organic matter, indicating that the modified UF membrane primarily relied on the pore size exclusion effect to remove large molecular substances. As shown in Figure 4d, with the increase in CS reaction concentration, the average pore size of the modified UF membrane gradually decreased.

Figure 4

(a) Water flux; (b) average pore sizes, (c) removal efficiencies for turbidity, UV254, and DOC; and (d) molecular weight distribution changes of organic matters for crosslinked CS-modified UF membranes.

The natural surface water was selected as the raw water, and the separation performance of the modified UF membrane in treating actual water was further explored. The removal capacity of fluorescent organic matter by UF membranes characterized by EEM spectra is shown in Figure 5a–f. With the increase in CS reaction concentration, the intensity of peaks T1 and T2 in the raw water filtered by the modified UF membrane decreased significantly (especially when the CS reaction concentration exceeded 0.1 wt%). For the A and C peaks, as the CS addition amount increased, the fluorescence intensity also showed a significant decrease. Especially when the CS addition amount was 0.3 wt% and 0.4 wt% raw water, the C peak response value decreased by about 65.8%. In order to further quantitatively analyze the treatment effect of the modified UF membrane on raw water, the fluorescence region was divided into five typical regions, and the integration method was used to integrate the different regions, and the results are shown in Figure 5g. As shown in Figure 5h, with the increase in reaction concentration, the removal rates of different fluorescent regions all increased. Among them, the removal rates of CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.1, CS-UFM0.2, CS-UFM0.3, and CS-UFM0.4 for Region I were all above 51.1%; for Region II, they were all above 8.9%; for Region III, they were all above 8.1%; for Regions IV, they were all above 29.3%, and for Region V were all above 13.5%, indicating that the modified UF had good removal effects on organic matter in raw water. In addition, it was found through the regional integration results that when the CS reaction concentration was 0.4 wt%, the removal rate of organic matter was the highest. This was mainly attributed to the increase in CS concentration, which led to a narrower pore size, thereby observing a high removal rate of fluorescent organic components [48]. Figure 5i showed the distribution of organic particle sizes in water after filtration of raw water, and the particle size of organic matter significantly decreased after treatment with the modified UF membrane. Especially when the CS addition amount was 0.4 wt%, the particle size of the effluent decreased to 50 nm.

Figure 5

EEM spectra of (a) raw water; (b) permeate of CS-UFM0; (c) permeate of CS-UFM0.1; (d) permeate of CS-UFM0.2; (e) permeate of CS-UFM0.3; (f) permeate of CS-UFM0.4; (g) percentage of different regions; (h) removal efficiencies of different regions; and (i) particle size distributions.

3.4 Anti-fouling behavers and mechanism insights of CS-UFM membranes

Three modified membranes with typical morphological features, namely, CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.2, and CS-UFM0.4, were selected for testing in fouling experiments. Fouling tests were conducted over four cycles using HA as a model pollutant to evaluate the anti-fouling performance of the modified UF membranes. As shown in Figure 6a, the flux of all UF membranes gradually decreased, but the comparison of flux decline rates revealed the following sequence of anti-fouling performance: CS-UFM0.4 > CS-UFM0.2 > CS-UFM0. Specifically, at the end of the fourth pollution test cycle, the normalized water flux (J/J ₀) of CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.2, and CS-UFM0.4 membranes was 0.45, 0.32, and 0.15, respectively. Among them, the CS-UFM0.4 membrane exhibited the least flux decline, indicating minimal pollutant deposition and superior anti-fouling performance. The FDR can be calculated based on the J/J ₀ values at the end of each pollution cycle. As shown in Figure 6b, for the three types of UF membranes, the FDR values gradually increased with the extension of the pollution cycle, indicating the gradual accumulation of irreversible membrane fouling. Furthermore, partial removal of accumulated pollutants on the membrane surface was achieved when hydraulic cleaning measures were employed, but with the increase in filtration cycles, the cleaning efficiency gradually declined [49]. The FRR values of UF in the three contamination cycle experiments are compared in Figure 6c, and it was found that with the extension of the filtration cycle, the FRR value decreased gradually, presenting a completely opposite trend to that of the FDR value. Specifically, the FRR values decreased from 90% to 69%, from 82% to 59%, and from 66% to 38.5% for CS-UFM0, CS-UFM0.2, and CS-UFM0.4 membranes, respectively. It is worth noting that the CS-UFM0.4 membrane had a lower FDR, which indicated that the CS-UFM0.4 membrane had excellent antifouling performance. The excellent anti-fouling performance of the CS-UFM0.4 membrane was mainly attributed to three aspects: first, the relatively smooth membrane surface was unfavorable for the deposition of pollutants, while irregular surfaces easily captured pollutants during the filtration process; second, under the same initial water flux, the CS-UFM0.4 membrane had relatively smaller pore sizes, making it difficult for pollutants to enter the support layer and facilitate the formation of a relatively loose cake layer, which was conducive to removal via hydraulic cleaning; third, the enhanced electrostatic repulsion between the negatively charged membrane surface and HA reduced the deposition of fouling. The poor anti-pollution performance of the unmodified PES UF membrane is attributed to the smaller hydrophilicity and larger pore size of the CS-UFM0 membrane, which make it easier for pollutants to deposit on the membrane surface and for small organic molecules to continuously enter the membrane pores during the filtration process, ultimately leading to pore blockage and increased irreversible fouling, resulting in inferior anti-pollution performance [50].

Figure 6

Antifouling evaluation of crosslinked CS-modified UF membranes: (a) normalized water flux; (b) FDR; and (c) FRR.

4 Conclusion

In this work, CS-modified UF membranes were fabricated and applied to purify natural surface water. The role of CS in the morphology, structure, and separation performance of modified UF membranes was systematically evaluated. The surface morphology and chemical structure of UF membranes could be significantly altered by coating CS, enabling the targeted tailoring of high-performance UF membranes. The CS-coated UF possessed a smoother active layer and enhanced hydrophilicity, favoring an increase in water flux. During filtering of natural surface water, the CS-coated UF membrane exhibited better organic matter removals than the control membrane. The antifouling tests also confirmed the excellent anti-fouling performance of CS-UFM0.4. Considering the excellent separation efficiency and operational feasibility, the CS coating strategy had the potential to modulate the performance of UF membranes for real-world environmental applications.

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Acknowledgements

This research was jointly supported by the Shandong Provincial small and medium-sized enterprise innovation ability improvement project (2023TSGC0313), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52300089, 52100088), the Introduction and Cultivation Plan for Young Innovative Talents of Colleges and Universities by the Education Department of Shandong Province, and the Shandong Top Talent Special Foundation (No. 0031504).

Funding information: Authors state no funding involved.
Author contributions: Qi Qiu: writing – original draft, writing – review and editing, and formal analysis; Feng Xu: conceptualization and formal analysis; Weiwei Zhou: writing – review, formal analysis, methodology, and funding acquisition; Xiaojuan Zhao: formal analysis; Yunwei Li: validation; Hongbo Gao: methodology; Shaofang Sun: validation; Hanyun Li: formal analysis; Xuewu Zhu: writing – review and editing; Daoji Wu: conceptualization and supervision.
Conflict of interest: Authors state no conflict of interest.
Data availability statement: The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Received: 2024-05-29

Accepted: 2024-10-12

Published Online: 2024-12-02

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/gps-2024-0115

Keywords for this article

chitosan; ultrafiltration membrane; surface water; natural organic matter; anti-fouling performance

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