A polyoxometalate-based self-cleaning smart material with oxygenic activity for water remediation with membrane technology

An unprecedented solution for alleviating non-restorable fouling in water treatment membrane processes is herein proposed and described. A novel smart material with oxygenic activity was developed starting from a polymerizable bicontinuous microemulsion (PBM) containing a surfactant encapsulated polyoxometalate (SEP) as catalyst. This material (PBM-SEP) was used for the surface functionalization of commercial ultrafiltration (UF) membranes by allowing the polymerization of the SEP-containing PBM to take place after casting on membrane surface. This has allowed obtaining a composite membrane with self-cleaning properties toward non-restorable fouling, thanks to the oxygenic activity of the embedded catalyst, resulting from H2O2 dismutation. The newly developed smart material may find practical application to implement membrane technology for an efficient wastewater treatment.