The Effect of Fatty Acids to Protect Forward Osmosis Membranes from Damage

NASA has conducted research and development on forward osmosis (FO) membranes for wastewater reclamation in space since 1993. The lessons learned during operation of the International Space Station and FO based technologies on the ground taught us that reliability is a key limitation. Membranes are susceptible to organic fouling, oxidation and calcium scaling, and these factors tend to damage the membrane reducing their operating life and performance. The development of a Synthetic Biological Membrane (SBM), a membrane that mimics naturally occurring biological processes, will mitigate membrane damage and improve reliability. The SBM is a lipid-based membrane with a protective fatty acid layer configured for use in a FO water purification system. In this configuration, the protective layer on the surface of the lipid membrane is composed of fatty acids (FA). The FA interact with the chemicals found in the wastewater feed, and protect the membrane from damage. In this study, we conducted preliminary experiments to determine the feasibility of using fatty acids to alleviate damage from calcium scaling, oxidation and organic fouling.