Membranes have had a huge impact in molecular separations in aqueous systems, especially desalination. It is generally accepted that 40-70% of capital and operating costs in chemical and pharmaceutical industries are dedicated to separations; and a substantial fraction of this cost is related to processing of organic liquids. Membrane technology has the potential to provide game changing alternatives to conventional concentration and purification technologies such as adsorption, chromatography, liquid extraction, evaporation and distillation. The membranes must offer resilience in organic environments, display attractive selectivities, and have good permeance. Ideally they should also be resistant to physical aging and fouling under use.

This presentation will focus on research into advanced membranes for OSN and their applications from class-based separations in crude oil refining to purification of pharmaceuticals. Ultra-thin polymer films have been formed by interfacial polymerisation and have excellent permeance and high rejection. The fascinating crystal morphology of these membranes can manipulated to vary their selectivity, while defined microporosity can be introduced into ultra-thin polymer films through alignment of macrocyclic precursors. Moreover creation of monomers that auto-assemble in solution  to nanostructures that are preserved interfacial polymerisation can lead to outstanding performance. Finally integrally skinned asymmetric membranes with surfaces engineered through grafting can lead to membranes with anti-fouling properties.