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A recyclable supramolecular membrane for size-selective separation of nanoparticles

Nature Nanotechnology volume 6, pages 141–146 (2011)Cite this article

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Abstract

Most practical materials are held together by covalent bonds, which are irreversible. Materials based on noncovalent interactions can undergo reversible self-assembly, which offers advantages in terms of fabrication, processing and recyclability1, but the majority of noncovalent systems are too fragile to be competitive with covalent materials for practical applications, despite significant attempts to develop robust noncovalent arrays1,2,3,4. Here, we report nanostructured supramolecular membranes prepared from fibrous assemblies5 in water. The membranes are robust due to strong hydrophobic interactions6,7, allowing their application in the size-selective separation of both metal and semiconductor nanoparticles. A thin (12 µm) membrane is used for filtration (∼5 nm cutoff), and a thicker (45 µm) membrane allows for size-selective chromatography in the sub-5 nm domain. Unlike conventional membranes, our supramolecular membranes can be disassembled using organic solvent, cleaned, reassembled and reused multiple times.

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Figure 1: Supramolecular filtration membrane.
Figure 2: Filtration of gold nanoparticles Au3.
Figure 3: Retained nanoparticles in the supramolecular membrane.
Figure 4: Filtration experiments of gold nanoparticles Au2 and Au8.
Figure 5: Size-exclusion chromatography with quantum dots.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by grants from the Israel Science Foundation, the Minerva Foundation, the Gerhardt M.J. Schmidt Minerva Center for Supramolecular Architectures, and the Helen and Martin Kimmel Center for Molecular Design. The EM studies were conducted at the Irving and Cherna Moskowitz Center for Nano and Bio-Nano Imaging (Weizmann Institute). B.R. holds the Abraham and Jennie Fialkow Career Development Chair. The authors thank T. Shirman for help with gold nanoparticle synthesis and C. Shahar for assistance with TEM measurements. Thanks also go to D. Milstein for critical reading of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Organic Chemistry, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, 76100, Israel

    Elisha Krieg, Haim Weissman, Elijah Shirman & Boris Rybtchinski

  2. Department of Chemical Research Support, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, 76100, Israel

    Eyal Shimoni

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  1. Elisha Krieg
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Contributions

B.R., H.W. and E.K. conceived the project and planned the experiments. E.K. performed the synthesis and filtration experiments. E. Shimoni and H.W. carried out electron microscopy studies and data analysis. E. Shirman synthesized nanoparticles Au6, Au7, QD1 and QD2 and participated in data analysis. E.K. and B.R. wrote the paper. All authors discussed the results and commented on the paper. All authors contributed extensively to the work presented in this paper.

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Correspondence to Boris Rybtchinski.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Krieg, E., Weissman, H., Shirman, E. et al. A recyclable supramolecular membrane for size-selective separation of nanoparticles. Nature Nanotech 6, 141–146 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2010.274

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