| 초록 |
Excess amounts of the trace element, boron (B), in the potable water pose a health hazard. To improve the aqueous B removal in the commercial RO process, we proposed two simple methods using the reaction between B(OH)3 and diols. Firstly, the complexation of B(OH)3 and polyols makes the size of resulting boron complexes large enough to be rejected by the commercial RO membrane efficiently. It was demonstrated how favorable the xylitol, well-known for teeth protection, is for the complexation by using computational thermochemistry and lab-scale RO experiments. Secondly, to solve the problems (load increase and fouling in RO processes) of polyol addition, a boron-selective membrane was prepared by using water-resistant electrospun polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) mats stabilized in methanol. A qualitative confirmation of the chemisorption of B(OH)3 was carried out by the analysis of IR and Raman spectra combined with the harmonic frequency calculations. The Carmine method confirmed quantitatively that the adsorption capacities of PVA mats for aqueous boron were 0.0010~0.0025 g of aqueous boron per g of PVA mats at a low boron concentration. |
