Role of ring-size and side-chain length in artificial water channel permeability

POSTER

Abstract

Membranes are an integral part to the water-energy nexus and produce approximately 142 billion liters of desalinated water per day. A common trade-off observed in reverse osmosis membranes is an exchange between permeability and ion rejection (>99%). One such solution to overcome this upper bound is inspired by biological membranes that display high rejection and high permeability. Synthetic transmembrane channels mimic the function of aquaporin protein channels by promoting one-dimensional water transport and selectively transporting water via angstrom scale pores. We investigate one such synthetic channel architecture, ligand-appended pillarene, to evaluate how design parameters within the channel chemistry, such as channel ring-size (m=5,6), appended-ligand length (n=4,6,8), and appended chemistry, impacts the permeability of these synthetic channels.

*This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences Energy Frontier Research Centers program under Award Number DE-SC0023265.

Publication: (Planned) Duncan, T. J.; Behera, H.; Zhang, Z.; Marioni, N.; Kadulkar, S.; Sachar, H.; Zofchak, E.; Kumar, M.; Ganesan, V. Side-Chain and Ring-Size Effects on Permeability in Diphenyl Phosphine-Appended Pillarene.

Presenters

  • Tyler J Duncan

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

Authors

  • Tyler J Duncan

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Harekrushna Behera

    • The University of Texas at Austin

  • Paul R Irving

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Nico Marioni

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Harnoor S Sachar

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Meron Y. Tadesse

    • University of Texas at Austin
    • The University of Texas at Austin

  • Zidan Zhang

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Everett S Zofchak

    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Manish Kumar

    • University of Texas
    • The University of Texas at Austin
    • University of Texas at Austin

  • Venkatraghavan Ganesan

    • University of Texas at Austin
    • The University of Texas at Austin