Browsing by Author "Seah, Mei Qun"

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Citation - WoS: 8
Citation - Scopus: 10
Development of Surface Modified Pu Foam With Improved Oil Absorption and Reusability Via an Environmentally Friendly and Rapid Pathway
(Elsevier Sci Ltd, 2022) Seah, Mei Qun; Ng, Zhi Chien; Lau, Woei Jye; Gürsoy, Mehmet; Karaman, Mustafa; Wong, Tuck-Whye; Ismail, Ahmad Fauzi
Although the commercial polyurethane (PU) foams are hydrophobic in nature, they generally show low degree of reusability for oil and organic solvent absorption. In this work, we proposed a solvent-free and rapid surface functionalization approach based on chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process to improve the surface characteristics of PU foam, increasing not only its reusability but also its absorption capacity. Among the monomers used to functionalize the surface of foam, our results showed that only hexamethyldisiloxane (HMDSO) and 2,2,3,4,4,4-hexafluorobutyl acrylate (HFBA) were promising to increase the absorption performance of the control PU foam, owing to the enhanced foam's surface hydrophobicity (with contact angle increased from similar to 106 degrees to 120-135 degrees) without altering the foam's porosity. These promising features are attributed to the formation of ultrathin highly hydrophobic yet uniform layer on the foam surface. Further investigation indicated that the modified foams outperformed the control foam for the multicycle cyclohexane and crude oil absorption (up to 10 cycles) by showing significantly higher absorption capacity. The reusability of the modified foams could be further improved when ethanol was employed to rinse the saturated foam after each absorption cycle. Such solvent rinsing help in maintaining the foam absorption capacity. In conclusion, the proposed greener surface modification method clearly demonstrated its effectiveness in functionalizing the PU foam, leading to higher absorption capacity against cyclohexane and crude oil as well as higher degree of reusability.
Citation - WoS: 26
Citation - Scopus: 29
Environmentally Friendly Approach for the Fabrication of Polyamide Thin Film Nanocomposite Membrane With Enhanced Antifouling and Antibacterial Properties
(ELSEVIER, 2021) Khoo, Ying Siew; Seah, Mei Qun; Lau, Woei Jye; Liang, Yong Yeow; Karaman, Mustafa; Gürsoy, Mehmet; Ismail, Ahmad Fauzi
In this work, we employed an environmentally friendly approach based on plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PECVD) to modify titania nanotubes (TNTs), aiming to obtain better dispersion of nanofillers in polyamide (PA) layer of thin film nanocomposite (TFN) reverse osmosis membrane. Owing to the hydrophilic nature of TNTs, dispersing it homogenously in organic solvent during interfacial polymerization process is difficult to achieve. Therefore, the TNTs are mildly modified by PECVD technique in order to ameliorate its stability in organic solvent. Our results showed that depositing thin layer of methyl methacrylate (MMA) on the TNTs surface could enhance its dispersion quality in organic solvent and further improve the properties of PA layer by enhancing membrane water flux by 16% without compromising NaCl rejection. More importantly, the developed TFN membrane showed excellent fouling resistance by recording flux recovery rate of 85.77% compared to 57.94% shown by the control membrane. Its antibacterial property was also obviously better than that of control membrane. Overall, the developed TFN membrane demonstrated good performance stability with respect to NaCl rejection and water permeability and the trace amount of nanofillers detected in the water sample (in the level of mu g/L) did not negatively influence the membrane filtration performance.