3D printing nanoporous separation materials – towards scalable and sustainable membrane production

Over the past 20 years, 3D printing technologies have emerged as innovative tools to generate

macro-porous materials, with potential in complex structures impossible to otherwise develop

by traditional manufacturing. More recently, advanced composite materials have been

developed at the mili and micro scale following progress in new polymers and resins

formulations as well as greater resolution control for both Fused Deposition Modelling (FDM)

and Dynamic Light Polymerisation (DLP).

Breaching the micron-scale barrier, to generate nano-

porous materials has however remained to date a major challenge, due to either rheological

limitations or minimum printable pixel size achievable. New strategies arising from polymer

monoliths development have however emerged to generate ultra-porous materials, with

macron-sized thicknesses and yet nanoscale pores.

Our team has developed innovative

strategies based on advanced resins formulations to print nano-porous membranes, and nano-

textured catalysts as well as adsorbents. In this presentation, the feasibility to develop complex

3D membrane architectures with the novel process will be demonstrated for a range of

chemistries and materials. Nanocomposite structures with excellent nano-load distributions and

incorporation into porous polymeric matrixes will also be demonstrated.