• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.37 no.11
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• pp.649-655
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• 2015

As a novel water treatment membrane, concept of ceramic-based graphene membrane (CbGM) was suggested, and its mass transport behavior was investigated. The selectivity of CbGM was given by graphene material which is consisting of active layer, only transmitting water, but rejecting salts. Filtration-assisted assembly methods was employed as a facile method to fabricate CbGM. Surface morphology and characteristics of CbGM were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and contact angle. In addition, three different kinds of solutes (i.e., NaCl, $MgCl_2$, $Na_2SO_4$) were tested in batch forward osmosis system to confirm the mass transport behavior. Through surface morphology analysis and mass transport behavior, it was revealed that interlocking between graphene layers is very important, rather than thickness of laminated graphene layers, in terms of selectivity to CbGM. All the anions in each solute showed faster transport than those of cations. In addition, solutes which have high ion valence charge ratio of anion to cation ($Z^-/Z^+$) was easier to be passed through CbGM. It indirectly implied that the surface charge of CbGM appear to be positive. In addition, It showed that surface charge of CbGM has a great role on mass transport, in particular, transport of matter having charges, generally ions.