Provided is a gas filter, which includes an adsorptive membrane for adsorbing foreign substances contained in a gas, wherein the adsorptive membrane has a corrugated structure folded in a number of times or a structure having a plurality of projections, in order to increase a contact surface area of the gas per unit area, and wherein the adsorptive membrane includes: a support member having a plurality of first pores; and a first adsorptive member which is stacked on the support member and has a plurality of second pores formed therein and which is made by accumulating ion exchange nanofibers for adsorbing foreign substances.

The invention provides a filtration membrane which comprises a porous support and, covalently bonded to a surface thereof, a layer comprising a plurality of vesicles having transmembrane proteins incorporated therein, said vesicles being formed from an amphiphilic block copolymer; characterised in that within said layer, vesicles are covalently linked together to form a coherent mass. The membrane may be prepared by a process which comprises providing an aqueous suspension of vesicles having transmembrane proteins incorporated therein, said vesicles being formed from an amphiphilic block copolymer having reactive end groups; depositing said suspension of vesicles on a surface of a porous support; and providing reaction conditions such that covalent bonds are formed between different vesicles and between vesicles and said surface.

An inorganic structure body has a free-standing structure including a fibrous member and/or a shell. The fibrous member and/or the shell include a metal and/or an inorganic material and have a three-dimensionally continuous configuration. The free-standing structure may have a structure that is based on a nonwoven fabric or a porous membrane used as a substrate.

A method for removing microorganisms from liquid samples and a nanofiber containing liquid filtration medium that simultaneously exhibits high liquid permeability and high microorganism retention. Microorganisms such as bacteria, particularly B. Diminuta, are removed from a liquid by passing the liquid through a porous nanofiber containing filtration medium having a B. Diminuta LRV greater than about 9, and the nanofiber(s) has a diameter from about 10 nm to about 1,000 nm. Another method for removing microorganisms such as bacteria and Mycloplasma, includes passing the liquid through a porous nanofiber containing filtration medium having a microorganism LRV greater than about 8, and the nanofiber(s) has a diameter from about 10 nm to about 1,000 nm. The filtration medium can be in the form of a fibrous electro spun polymeric nanofiber liquid filtration medium mat.

A polymer fiber formed of statistical copolymers, each of which contains zwitterionic repeat units and hydrophobic repeat units, the zwitterionic repeat units constituting 20-75 wt % of the statistical copolymer and the hydrophobic repeat units being characterized in that a homopolymer formed thereof has a glass transition temperature above room temperature. Also disclosed is a fibrous membrane containing such polymer fibers in which greater than 90% of the polymer fibers are each independently rib bon-shaped fibers or wrinkly fibers. A method of preparing such a fibrous membrane is disclosed as well.

A filter medium including: a porous first support; nanofiber webs respectively stacked at the upper and lower parts of the first support, and made of a plurality of nanofibers of which the diameters have a standard deviation of 300 nm or less; and a porous second support interposed between the first support and the nanofiber web. The filter medium is implemented by fibers having uniform diameters, and thus is easily manufactured to have a predetermined pore diameter and simultaneously has excellent uniformity of the pore diameters, thereby having excellent filtering efficiency and being more suitable when selectively separating specific objects. Backwashing is enabled at uniform pressure during backwashing such that high cleaning power is obtained. The filter medium has excellent water permeability and excellent mechanical strength so as to minimize the shape and structural deformation and damage of the filter medium.

Membranes suitable for use in membrane distillation are provided. Such membranes may include nano-fibrous layers with adjustable pore sizes. The membranes may include a hydrophobic nano fibrous scaffold and a thin hydrophilic protecting layer that can significantly reduce fouling and scaling problems.

A hybrid membrane, particularly of polyacrylonitrile (PAN)/graphene oxide (GO)/SiO.sub.2, separates oil and water even from emulsions. The membrane can be made by one-step electrospinning, adding GO and SiO.sub.2 nanofillers in PAN in various concentrations. The nanofillers may be uniformly embedded in the nanofibrous structure of the electrospun hybrid membrane, with GO mainly embedded inside the PAN nanofibers and may cause knots, and/or SiO.sub.2 nanoparticles embedded on the nanofiber surface and may form micro-nano fiber surface protrusions. Hierarchical structures formed can have enhanced hydrophilicity due to oxygen-containing groups on both SiO.sub.2 and GO, and have >99% oil rejection from oil-water emulsions. Separation flux and phase rejection of gravity separation may be enhanced by incorporation of nanofillers, which may also enhance membrane mechanical properties. Separated water flux may be enhanced from 2600 (pure PAN) to 3151 Lm.sup.2h.sup.1 for the hybrid.

The disclosure describes a method of forming highly ordered membrane protein crystals. The forming process is done in the presence of a magnetic field to exploit the diamagnetic anisotropy of the membrane protein. Further described is a method of magnetic alignment and crystallization of membrane proteins in two-dimensional (2D) sheets for protein structural characterization and applications in functional devices. Block co-copolymers are used in alternative embodiments to assist with the crystallization process.

Embodiments described herein relate to electrospun nanofiber ultrafiltration membrane compositions capable of operating in tangential filtration mode and methods of using the same.