Three-Dimensional Membrane Imaging with X-ray Ptychography: Determination of Membrane Transport Properties for Membrane Distillation

Abstract Membrane distillation (MD) is a desalination technique that uses membrane to thermally separate potable water from sea or brackish water. The mass transport processes through the are commonly described by dusty gas model. These modeled assuming uniform, ideally cylindrical capillaries and adjusted for geometry including porosity tortuosity. tortuosity usually set 2 used as an adjusting parameter fit theoretical models experimentally measured data. In this work, ptychographic X-ray computed tomography employed map three-dimensional (3D) structure of three commercial state-of-the-art PTFE membranes in MD. porosity, permeability (viscous flow coefficient) samples using lattice Boltzmann method. intrinsic compared model apparent proposed which corrected Knudsen slip effects at structure. Article Highlights 3D full height unprecedented detail ptychography first time. Comparison direct numerical simulation: effects. characterization calculation hydraulic factor field simulations.