ABSTRACT
Surface Grafting ......................................................................................... 622 18.4.1 Photoinitiated Grafting on the Membrane Surface ...................... 623
18.4.1.1 Membrane Modication by UV Graft Polymerization without the Use of a Photoinitiator ..... 623
18.4.1.2 Membrane Modication by UV Graft Polymerization with a Photoinitiator ........... 625
18.4.2 Redox-and Miscellaneously Initiated Grafting ........................... 627 18.4.2.1 Redox-Initiated Grafting .............................................. 627 18.4.2.2 Enzymatic Grafting ..................................................... 628
18.4.3 Plasma-Initiated Grafting and Initiated Chemical Vapor Deposition on the Membrane Surface .......................................... 629 18.4.3.1 Plasma-Induced Grafting of the Membrane Surface .....629 18.4.3.2 Initiated Chemical Vapor Deposition .......................... 630
18.5 Fabrication of Low-Fouling Composite Membranes through Physical Coating ................................................................................................... 632 18.5.1 Coating through Casting ............................................................... 632 18.5.2 Static/Dynamic Deposition of Protective Low- Fouling Layer
on the Membrane Surface ............................................................. 635
A sharp growth in the world’s population coupled with urbanization results in a rapidly increasing demand in water consumption. Water shortage has plagued many communities around the world [1,2]. It is reported that more than 1.2 billion people in the world lack access to safe drinking water [3]. In order to avoid possible global crises due to depleting available resources of clean and potable water, the need is inevitable to maximize the treatment of wastewater, minimize the discharge from water treatment plants, and tap into the virtually unlimited available saltwater in the oceans. During the last decade, pressure-driven membrane processes such as micro-ltration (MF), ultraltration (UF), nanoltration (NF), and reverse osmosis (RO) have been thoroughly investigated and used for water treatment and desalination [4]. However, one of the main problems arising upon the operation of the membrane units is the membrane fouling, which seriously hampers the application of membrane technologies [5].
