On permeability of corrugated pore membranes

Ceramic membranes have great potential for water treatment and filtering applications. However, one of the drawbacks of ceramic membrane filtration is its low permeability due to small functioning nanometer pore size. Increasing the membrane permeability without impairing its filtration function is, therefore, a crucial and practical problem. From hydrodynamical perspectives, keeping the inlet radius of membrane pores unchanged but only re-defining the pore geometry also could help to improve the permeate flow rate. In this paper, the membrane permeability with corrugated pores is investigated via hydrodynamical simulations using smoothed particle hydrodynamics. For a given corrugation length, it is found that there exists a range of values of the corrugation amplitude in which the membrane permeability is enhanced and a peak value is also achieved. On expanding the corrugation length, the range of the corrugation amplitude for permeability enhancement is larger and its permeability is further improved. The ratio of the corrugation amplitude to the corrugation length is found to be the key factor for permeability enhancement.