Removal of heavy metal ions using a new high performance nanofiltration membrane modified with curcumin boehmite nanoparticles

[Display omitted] •The boehmite functionalized with curcumin was used for synthesize of membranes.•The PES/B-Cur membranes showed high permeation flux and antifouling resistance.•The PES/B-Cur0.5 membrane exhibited high rejection towards heavy metal ions.•The modified membranes showed high adsorption capacity for heavy metal ions. The PES/B-Cur membranes were prepared by incorporating boehmite nanoparticles functionalized with curcumin (B-Cur) into PES membrane via phase inversion method. The PES/B-Cur membranes were characterized in terms of average pore size, pore size distribution, porosity, specific surface area, water contact angle, and zeta potential. Characterization techniques like ATR-IR, XRD, and XPS were used to confirm the presence of B-Cur nanoparticles in the PES/B-Cur membranes. The morphological properties of B-Cur nanoparticles and the PES/B-Cur membranes were studied using FESEM. performance of the membranes was also evaluated for pure water flux, antifouling behavior, and removal of heavy metal ions (Fe2+, Cu2+, pb2+, Mn2+, Ni2+, and Zn2+). The PES/B-Cur membrane showed relatively high pure water flux (120–140 kg/m2h) than PES membrane, due to an increase in pore size, porosity, and hydrophilicity. Moreover, the heavy metal ion removal capability of the resulting membranes significantly increased due to the formation of chelated metal ions at the surface of the PES/B-Cur membrane in the presence of B-Cur nanoparticles. The Fe2+, Cu2+, pb2+, Mn2+, Zn2+, and Ni2+ rejection measured 99.88, 98.72, 99.61, 99.31, 99.11, and 99.51% for PES membrane containing 0.5 wt% B-Cur nanoparticles whereas they were 15.13, 14.21, 16.43, 14.38, 15.11, and 14.98% for PES. The PES membrane containing 0.5 wt% B-Cur nanoparticles showed the maximum adsorption capacity of 35.01 mg/g (for Pb2+), 32.20 mg/g for (for Ni2+), 31.12 mg/g (for Cu2+), 29.08 mg/g (for Fe2+), 27.08 mg/g (for Zn2+), and 25.32 mg/g (for Mn2+). In addition, the PES/B-Cur0.5 showed higher permeate flux and FRR than other samples through the entire process of filtration. The reusability results for the PES/B-Cur0.5 exhibited a slight reduction in rejection of Fe2+, Cu2+, pb2+, Mn2+, Ni2+, and Zn2+ by only 14.5, 15.3, 13.5, 14.4, 15.1, and 14.0%.