Incorporation of aquaporins into polymeric membranes for water purification

Abstract

Many regions of the world are facing the water shortages as urgent and major challenge. Biomimetic membrane desalination is proposed as the most promising among various technologies of water purification, using the aquaporin as robust water channel with high transport efficiency. However, the vulnerability and functionality of the aquaporins still remain challenging in the biomimetic membrane fabrication and applications. The thesis objectives are to fabricate and study robust aquaporin-incorporated polymeric vesicles for the protein deposition and functionality in the biomimetic membranes and also to propose and investigate novel strategies of aquaporin embedment in different membrane substrates. So two different strategies of copolymer/lipid hybrid and polyelectrolyte-adsorbed vesicles are studied and proved to enhanced vesicle stability and protein functionality. Also two different approaches of aquaporin-incorporated vesicle integration in the commercial membranes and aquaporin embedment in hydrogel membrane for nanofiltration are studied and the latter is proved of high feasibility and promising.