Smart Piezoelectric Hybrid Ceramic Membrane With the Capacity of Pulsed Responsive Self-Cleaning and Anti-Fouling Functions.

Organic fouling remains a major challenge for ceramic membrane filtration because of the strong adsorption of organic foulants on membrane surfaces. Herein, a novel design strategy is proposed for smart piezoelectric hybrid ceramic membranes featuring self-powered nano-brushes. Specifically, a self-powered nano-brush smart piezoelectric hybrid ceramic membrane (ATPAA--PBM) with the pulsed pressure responsiveness and self-cleaning capability was prepared by grafting negatively charged sodium PAA polymer chain (PAA-) on the surface of BaTiO3 (BTO) piezoelectric ceramic membrane. Under the pulsed pressure, alternating piezoelectric charges induced reversible conformational oscillations of the self-powered nano-brushes, promoting the detachment of the foulant layer by the flowing water and thereby enabling in situ self-cleaning. Meanwhile, the grafted PAA- nano-brushes strongly associated with water molecules to establish a 462 nm-thick hydration layer, while generating electrostatic repulsion toward humic acid (HA), jointly preventing foulant adhesion and enabling nearly complete rejection. The membrane exhibited outstanding retention, anti-fouling ability, and remarkable flux retention ratio (FRR = 92.3%, 10 d) during a long-term filtration process. Consequently, a novel excellent rejection and anti-fouling mechanism of "self-powered nano-brush dynamic oscillation self-cleaning & hydration barrier" was proposed. This study provides a new perspective for the fabrication of self-cleaning smart piezoelectric hybrid ceramic membranes.