Multifunctional Polymer Membranes for Environment, Energy, and Health
Our research focuses on design, synthesis, processing, and characterization of multifunctional polymers and polymer based composite materials for energy-efficient separation, energy storage, and biomedical devices to address challenges in the Water-Energy Nexus and in Health.
We study the relationship between polymer chemistry, processing, structure, and transport properties for separation science. Specifically, we explore the influence of polymer’s chemical and physical structures on transport properties such as sorption, diffusion, and permeation of small molecules in polymers and polymer-based materials. These fundamental studies are critical for membranes for liquid, gas and vapor separations, energy storage, selective removal of unwanted molecules from various chemical streams, selective recovery of critical and precious elements, biomedical devices, controlled drug-delivery, and barrier materials for food and packaging.
Polymer Membranes for Molecule Separations
By tuning the chemistry and morphology of polymer membranes, we can selectively transport target molecules while reject others for various applications.
Potential Applications
Polymer membranes play central roles in technologies related to clean water (reverse osmosis desalination, forward osmosis), in energy storage (polymer electrolytes in batteries and fuel cells, electrodialysis, artificial photosynthesis), and in biomedical engineering (sensors, drug release and capture, hemodialysis). Even though membranes target a diverse set of applications, a thorough understanding of their selective and controlled transport of small molecules (e.g., water, ions, and other solutes) is central to achieving attractive property sets for these processes. Designing new membranes with a set of previously unachievable transport properties will have an enormous impact on many applications, including energy-efficient preparations, energy storage and health-related devices, to name a few.
Challenges in Membrane Fields
However, only a few membrane materials and formation methods are used in industry today, and current desalination membranes often lack the chemical stability for use with all water sources. Similarly, current polymer electrolytes in batteries require facilitated ion transport for improved cell performance. Our molecular level understanding of water and ion transport in polymers is in its infancy, presenting many rich research opportunities. A lack of basic property data (diffusivity, solubility, permeability, conductivity) limits our ability to elucidate a fundamental theoretical foundation, slowing our capacity to design innovative materials.
Moreover, polymer membranes are a key component of biomedical devices for selective molecular transport. Due to longer life expectancies, the prevalence of age-related diseases is increasing rapidly, and the need to develop biomedical devices that can solve big health problems is greater, but our material sets are limited.
Our Research Focus
Designing new membranes with a set of previously unachievable transport properties will have an enormous impact on many applications. Therefore, our research focuses on a comprehensive fundamental understanding of small molecule transport in membranes, as well as the influence of polymer chemical and physical structure on transport properties. We design and synthesize new multifunctional polymers, develop processing methods for new structures, and evaluate their transport and structural properties. This will guide the preparation of high performance polymers for the aforementioned technologies including liquid, gas and vapor separations, energy storage, selective removal of unwanted molecules from various chemical streams, selective recovery of critical and precious elements, biomedical devices, controlled drug-delivery, and barrier materials for food and packaging.
In addition, new membranes will be integrated with recent developments in additive manufacturing i.e., 3D printing—to form previously nonexistent 3D complex structures with functional polymers.
Our Research Methods
We design and synthesize new multifunctional polymers, develop processing methods for new structures, and evaluate their transport and structural properties. Specifically, we explore the influence of polymer’s chemical and physical structures on transport properties such as sorption, diffusion, conduction, and permeation of small molecules in polymers and polymer-based materials.
Biomedical Separation Membranes to Help People Fight Cancer
Due to longer life expectancies, the prevalence of age-related diseases is increasing rapidly, and the need for developing biomedical devices that can solve big health problems is similarly greater. Inspired by absorption columns, which are routinely used in industry to remove pollutants from chemical streams, this research describes the design of biomedical devices for capturing unwanted toxins in the body. One significant benefit of using polymer membranes is their tunable binding affinity to target molecules using specific chemical, physical, or biological features.
In particular, polymer membranes can be used to filter out toxic chemotherapy drugs and other unwanted molecules in the body. To achieve this goal, I seek to integrate the advantageous characteristics of polymer chemistry, membrane science, medicine, and advanced additive manufacturing. The bio-adsorption approach is general and may be useful for treating other diseases.
Biosponge Polymer Adsorbers for Capturing Toxic Ionic Chemotherapy Drugs before They Spread through the Body
Cancer is becoming the leading cause of death in most developed nations. Although there have been enormous efforts to develop more targeted and personalized cancer therapeutics, current dosing of drugs in cancer chemotherapy is often limited by systemic toxic side effects. During intraarterial chemotherapy infusion to a target organ, more than 50-80% of the injected drug is not trapped in the target organ, bypasses the tumor, and, causes toxic side effects.
In the context of reducing the toxicity of chemotherapy, a new biomedical device was recently developed: a porous polymer absorber that captures excess chemotherapeutic drug before it spreads through the body. This absorber is temporarily deployed in the vein draining the organ undergoing intra-arterial chemotherapy infusion and is removed after the infusion is complete. Minimally invasive image-guided endovascular surgical procedures are used to deliver the drug to the tumor and place the absorber in the exiting vein.
We showed successful deployment of the absorbing device without any significant blood clots nor bio-compatibility issues, and a significant fraction of injected drug was removed as well.
(Other news reports can be found here)
Our research will focus on the design of polymer membranes for capturing other significantly effective chemotherapy drugs that show severe toxic side effects but do not have any substitutes.
