Membrane Engineering Lab @ CYCU

Membranes are dense or porous polymeric, ceramic, metallic or composite interfaces whose function is to separate solutes. Their development and the assessment of their performances require knowledge in multiple fields including materials science, environmental engineering, chemical engineering, biomedical engineering, etc. depending also on the field of application. They have been around for many decades, yet fortunately, hold many secrets. I voluntarily used the word "fortunately" because these secrets justify the time and efforts put by numerous teams worldwide to engineer better membranes for more efficient processes and hopefully, a more sustainable environment.

Our team forming the Membrane Engineering Lab is working to contribute to these efforts, and this page aims to showcase our current research themes. From an application perspective, we focus on removing bacteria and emerging water pollutants (such as antibiotics, steroid hormones, and PFAS) using various processes, including photocatalytic membrane reactors, direct contact membrane distillation, and more common pressure-driven ultrafiltration or microfiltration. To achieve these goals, we prepare membranes via liquid-induced or vapor-induced phase separation. We are also involved in biomedical filtration—particularly blood filtration—which sometimes requires fabricating membranes by electrospinning and imparting membranes with specific functional properties. Finally, regardless of the fabrication process or targeted application, we place great importance on understanding and controlling the mechanisms that govern membrane morphology.