Monosodium Glutamate Influence on Cellulose Acetate Hemodialysis Membranes

Abstract The influence of monosodium glutamate (MSG) additive and its concentration on the performance of hemodialysis membrane were investigated. Concentration of MSG was varied from 1 wt% to 8 wt% and the performance of the hemodialysis membrane was evaluated in terms of urea clearance and bovine serum albumin (BSA) rejection. Results revealed that membrane with 6 wt% of MSG, which was fabricated from 64 wt% formic acid and 10 wt% distilled water, achieved the best urea clearance of 53.20% and BSA rejection of 94%. SEM images illustrated that the increment of MSG concentration in the casting solution tends to promote macrovoids formation. However, when the amount of MSG was further increased beyond 6 wt%, the urea clearance was reduced and the macrovoids structure disappeared. FTIR spectra indicated that both N[sbnd]H and C[sbnd]N bonds from MSG were absent indicating that the MSG was removed during phase inversion. Keywords: cellulose acetatedialysis membraneformic acidmonosodium glutamateurea clearance performance Financial support from the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment, Malaysia through IRPA funding vote no. 79037 is acknowledged with gratitude.