Issue 2, 2024

3D printed filtration and separation devices with integrated membranes and no post-printing assembly

Abstract

Additive manufacturing, or three-dimensional (3D) printing, is an accessible, quick, and user-friendly tool for fabricating reactors and chemical processing devices. Here we report a method for printing filtration and separation devices using fused-deposition modelling (FDM) which incorporate commercial porous membranes. By using exogenous membranes, membrane pore size and material can be arbitrarily specified allowing much greater versatility in device design. We show for the first time that fully operational monolithic devices can be created without need for post-printing assembly and demonstrate the efficacy of the approach by making and testing three distinct devices: dead-end filters, which can be made in a range of sizes and are shown to fully remove micron-sized particles from a heterogenous mixture; liquid–liquid separators, which are shown to completely separate segmented flows of immiscible liquids; and a cross-flow filtration device, which is shown to achieve near full dye removal from an aqueous stream with a residence time of 3.4 minutes. For the cross-flow filtration device we describe a new “double-sided” printing technique whereby the plastic is directly printed onto both sides of the membrane to ensure the membrane is fully bonded to the 3D printed body. The range of devices showcased here highlights the versatility of the approach and its potential for use in chemical processing applications that require porous membranes.

Graphical abstract: 3D printed filtration and separation devices with integrated membranes and no post-printing assembly

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
24 Apr 2023
Accepted
27 Sep 2023
First published
06 Oct 2023
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

React. Chem. Eng., 2024,9, 251-259

3D printed filtration and separation devices with integrated membranes and no post-printing assembly

M. J. Clark, T. Garg, K. E. Rankin, D. Bradshaw and A. M. Nightingale, React. Chem. Eng., 2024, 9, 251 DOI: 10.1039/D3RE00245D

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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