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Bioinspired hierarchical porous membrane for efficient uranium extraction from seawater

Nature Sustainability volume 5, pages 71–80 (2022)Cite this article

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Abstract

The oceans offer a virtually infinite source of uranium and could sustain nuclear power technology in terms of fuel supply. However, the current processes to extract uranium from seawater remain neither economically viable nor efficient enough to compete with uranium ore mining. Microporous polymers are emerging materials for the adsorption of uranyl ions due to their rich binding sites, but they still fall short of satisfactory performance. Here, inspired by the ubiquitous fractal structure in biology that is favourable for mass and fluid transfer, we describe a hierarchical porous membrane based on polymers of intrinsic microporosity that can capture uranium in seawater. This biomimetic membrane allows for rapid diffusion of uranium species, leading to a 20-fold higher uranium adsorption capacity in a uranium-spiked water solution (32 ppm) than the membrane with only intrinsic microporosity. Furthermore, in natural seawater, the membrane can extract as much uranium as 9.03 mg g−1 after four weeks. This work suggests a strategy to be extended to the rational design of a large family of microporous polymer adsorbents that could fulfil the vast promise of the oceans to fuel a reliable and potentially sustainable energy source.

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Fig. 1: Biological inspiration and schematic of the bioinspired hierarchical porous membrane.
Fig. 2: Characterization of PIM-1, AO-PIM-1 and the hierarchical porous membrane.
Fig. 3: Uranium adsorption performance of the hierarchical porous membrane.
Fig. 4: pH dependence of uranium adsorption performance of the hierarchical porous membrane.
Fig. 5: Reusability of the hierarchical porous membrane and its uranium adsorption performance in seawater.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available in the paper and its Supplementary Information files.

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Acknowledgements

L.W. acknowledges funding support from the National Natural Science Foundation (grant no. 21625303) and the National Key R&D Program of China (grant nos 2017YFA0206904 and 2017YFA0206900). L.J. acknowledges funding support from the National Natural Science Foundation (grant no. 21988102). X.-Y.K. acknowledges funding support from the National Natural Science Foundation (grant no. 21905287).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CAS Key Laboratory of Bio-inspired Materials and Interfacial Science, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, P. R. China

    Linsen Yang, Hongyan Xiao, Xiaolu Zhao, Xiang-Yu Kong, Pei Liu, Weiwen Xin, Lin Fu, Lei Jiang & Liping Wen

  2. School of Future Technology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, P. R. China

    Linsen Yang, Pei Liu, Weiwen Xin, Lin Fu, Lei Jiang & Liping Wen

  3. Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Macromolecular Science and Technology, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an, P. R. China

    Yongchao Qian

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Contributions

L.W. proposed the research direction and guided the project. L.Y. designed and performed the experiments. L.Y., H.X., X.-Y.K., P.L., W.X., L.F. and L.J. analysed and discussed the experimental results and drafted the paper. H.X. performed the MD simulations. Y.Q. and X.Z. joined the discussion of the data and gave helpful suggestions. All authors contributed to the writing of the paper.

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Correspondence to Liping Wen.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Peer review information Nature Sustainability thanks Chong Liu, Hongjuan Ma, Costas Tsouris and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Yang, L., Xiao, H., Qian, Y. et al. Bioinspired hierarchical porous membrane for efficient uranium extraction from seawater. Nat Sustain 5, 71–80 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-021-00792-6

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