Pouring-type gravity-driven oil–water separation without water bridge
- Author(s): Ziai Liu 1 ; Xuyue Wang 1, 2 ; Jinlong Song 1, 2 ; Tamal Roy 3 ; Shude Li 1 ; Jiyu Liu 1 ; Liu Huang 1 ; Xin Liu 1, 2 ; Zhuji Jin 1, 2 ; Danyang Zhao 1, 2
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View affiliations
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Affiliations:
1:
Key Laboratory for Precision and Non-traditional Machining Technology of the Ministry of Education , Dalian University of Technology , Dalian 116024 , People's Republic of China ;
2: Collaborative Innovation Center of Major Machine Manufacturing in Liaoning , Dalian University of Technology , Dalian 116024 , People's Republic of China ;
3: Institute for Nano-and-Microfluidics, Center of Smart Interfaces, Technische Universität Darmstadt , Darmstadt 64287 , Germany
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Affiliations:
1:
Key Laboratory for Precision and Non-traditional Machining Technology of the Ministry of Education , Dalian University of Technology , Dalian 116024 , People's Republic of China ;
- Source:
Volume 12, Issue 10,
October
2017,
p.
744 – 748
DOI: 10.1049/mnl.2017.0011 , Online ISSN 1750-0443
Oil pollution brings great challenge to environmental protection. Utilising oil–water separation device to separate and recycle oils is an environment-friendly approach to dispose mixtures containing oils. Pouring-type gravity-driven oil–water separation method based on extremely wettable materials is an interesting area of research because of its high separation velocity, selectivity and purity. However, the presence of water bridge results in low separation efficiency. Herein, the authors first synthesised a facile etching method and a dip-coating method to fabricate contrary extreme wettability sponges including superhydrophilic–underwater-superoleophobic (SHI–U-SOO) sponge and superhydrophobic–superoleophilic (SHO–SOI) sponge. Accordingly, they designed a three-way oil–water separation system whose left and right bottom tubes were installed with the SHI–U-SOO sponge and the SHO–SOI sponge, respectively. Water and oil separately flow out from the left and right tubes, thereby eliminating the water bridge and increasing separation efficiency, and still having ideal separation selectivity and separation purity. The developed three-way oil–water separation system has promising application prospects in disposing oil spills, oil leakage from factories and industrial effluents.
Inspec keywords: separation; recycling; oil pollution; water pollution control
Other keywords: recycling; waste disposal; water bridges; environmental protection; industrial effluents; Q1 pouring-type gravity-driven oil-water separation; oil pollution; dip coating; etching method; wettability
Subjects: Water (environmental science); Environmental issues; Contamination remediation (environmental science technology); Industrial processes; Recycling
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