Authors: Yisa Zhou, Ying Wu, Haoyu Wu, Jian Xue, Li Ding, Rui Wang, Haihui Wang
Published: 2022-10-04
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-33654-6
Source: Full article
AbstractTwo-dimensional graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) nanosheets are ideal candidates for membranes because of their intrinsic in-plane nanopores. However, non-selective defects formed by traditional top-down preparation and the unfavorable re-stacking hinder the application of these nanosheets in gas separation. Herein, we report lamellar g-C3N4 nanosheets as gas separation membranes with a disordered layer-stacking structure based on high quality g-C3N4 nanosheets through bottom-up synthesis. Thanks to fast and highly selective transport through the high-density sieving channels and the interlayer paths, the membranes, superior to state-of-the-art ones, exhibit high H2 permeance of 1.3 × 10−6 mol m−2 s−1 Pa−1 with excellent selectivity for multiple gas mixtures. Notably, these membranes show excellent stability under harsh practice-relevant environments, such as temperature swings, wet atmosphere and long-term operation of more than 200 days. Therefore, such lamellar membranes with high quality g-C3N4 nanosheets hold great promise for gas separation applications.