Electrospun membranes filtering 100 nm particles from air flow by means of the van der Waals and Coulomb forces

Nonwoven fibrous filter membranes are widely used in filtration because of their low cost. They are less effective in intercepting airborne particles of the order of 100 nm, which is of the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) virus’s size. Many diseases, including COVID-19, predominantly spread by droplets released by breathing, coughing, sneezing, or medical procedures. It was shown that the smallest droplets can evaporate in air before settling, thus, making viruses airborne and easily penetrating even the best masks and filters. As a result, air-filtering membranes, which are capable of effective interception of ∼100 nm nanoparticles are highly desirable. A traditional way to improve filtration efficiency by overlapping several layers of nonwoven fabrics increases the required pressure drop, and thus, should be avoided as much as possible. Here, we propose and demonstrate an innovative approach to enhance performance of filtration membranes based on (i) a dramatic reduction in the fiber size, and (ii) metal coating of the fibers. The first component of this approach allows one to incorporate a novel physical mechanism of filtration, the short-range van der Waals forces, whereas the second one adds the long-range electric Coulomb forces if the oncoming nanoparticles are pre-charged and the metal-plated membrane grounded. In the present work, the ∼100 nm aluminum nanoparticles are filtered as a model of commensurate airborne single COVID-19 viruses, and Platinum is used as the sputter-coated material for the fiber coating. The resulting filtration efficiency enhanced by the electric Coulomb forces alone is increased by the factor of 1.77, while the filtration efficiency additionally facilitated by the van der Waals forces increased by the factor of 2.44. In comparison to the filter membranes with ∼500 nm fibers without the electric forces involved, the van-der-Waals-electric filter membrane with fibers ∼90 nm is 2.24 [Formula: see text] 1.77 = 3.96 times more effective. The quality factor of a membrane which combines the van der Waals and Coulomb forces is 10.6 psi(−1), which is almost three times that of a comparable membrane without the electric Coulomb force (with only van der Waals forces being used).