Development of composite membranes as selective adsorbent for Yttrium ion

Polybenzimidazole based composite membranes (65 TSAD, 50 TSAD and 35 TSAD) were prepared by incorporating different amounts (wt %) of inorganic hetero poly acids (IHAD) into polybenzimidazole (PBI) matrix. IHAD was synthesized by reacting silicotungstic acid with tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) in the presence of acid. Structural, morphological and thermal characteristics of all the composite membranes were studied by FT-IR, XRD, SEM and TGA and further investigated functional relationships between the materials structure and metal ion uptake using Hg(II), Pb(II), Y(III), and Cd(II). It was found that composite membranes were more selective toward Y(III), and further uptake capacity of composite membranes is highly reliant on the amount of IHAD contents. The composite membrane containing high IHAD contents (35 TSAD) exhibited high thermal stability and high uptake capacity toward Y(III), which was experimentally determined to be 2.48 mgg^-1.