45-0
Chapter One
Transport of Gases and Vapors
in Glassy and Rubbery Polymers
Scott Matteucci, Yuri Yampolskii, Benny D. Freeman and Ingo Pinnau
1.1 Background and Phenomenology
Transport in non-porous polymeric membranes
is based on the so-called 'solution-diffusion' concept.
This model, formulated in the 19th
century, is grounded in the works of J. K. Mitchell,
T. Graham and S. von Wroblewski,
who demonstrated that the presence of microscopic
open pores or capillaries was not a prerequisite
for mass transfer through polymeric films
(or septa as they were referred to), such as natural
rubber. First, Graham in 1829, and then
Mitchell in 1831, noted that gases were
capable of permeating through non-porous rubber
films and that this process was related to gas dissolution
and diffusion in the polymeric materials.
The currently accepted interpretation of such
experiments was given several decades later by
Graham (this and other articles from the
early history of membrane science have been
reproduced, in part, in a special ... read full excerpt from Materials Science of Membranes for Gas and Vapor Separation: ebook
