Facilities | Advanced Membranes Lab

The Advanced Membranes Lab is fully equipped to synthesize, test, and characterize membrane materials, including the synthesis of polymers, nanomaterials, and small molecules. We are also users of some of the fantastic central facilities at U of T, including OCCAM (SEM, TEM, AFM), CRAFT (coatings, advanced 3D printing), CSICOMP NMR Facility in Chemistry, and ANALEST (solution chemistry, IR spectroscopy).

The equipment that we house are generally quite specialized and/or custom. We are open to external users having access to our equipment, with nominal fees for some instruments (see table below). Please contact Jay if interested. Images of our equipment are below.

Overall Rooms

The Water Analysis and TReatment (WATR) Lab in WB233

Specialized Characterization Equipment

Dynamic Vapor Sorption (DVS)

IgaSorp-CT from Hiden Isochema. The system is compatible with water vapor and organic solvents. We use this instrument to measure diffusivity and sorption of vapors in polymer films.

Dynamic Light Scattering (DLS)

Nanobrook90 PALS from Brookhaven Instruments

Spectral Reflectometer

Filmetrics F20-UV. This instrument can be used to rapidly measure film thickness in the 10 nm – 10 um range.

Contact Angle Goniometer

Theta Lite from Biolin Scientific

Equipment User Fees

		UofT internal [Run your own sample]	UofT internal [AM lab runs the sample]	External [AM lab runs all external samples; billing through CERCL (cercl.com); 25% admin fee additional]
Instrument Name	Experiment Type
DVS Analyzer	Water sorption-desorption experiments	Not applicable	$60/day	$120/day instrument time; $100/hr personnel time
DVS Analyzer	WVTR (Water Vapor Transmission Rate) experiments	Not applicable	$60/day (sample holder cost additional)	$120/day instrument time (sample holder cost additional); $100/hr personnel time
DVS Analyzer	Experiments with other solvents *	Not applicable	See note*	$200/day instrument time; $100/hr personnel time
DLS		$20/30 min	$60/30 min	$100/30 min (instrument + personnel time)
DLS	Zeta-potential	$30/30 min	$70/30 min	$120/30 min (instrument + personnel time)
Contact Angle		$20/30 min	$60/30 min	$100/30 min (instrument + personnel time)

Training Fee of $100 for each of the instruments (DLS & Zeta-potential can be done together for a single fee)

* Instrument access limited to research collaboration with AM Lab

Membrane Filtration Systems

Three 1-Cell Crossflow Ultrafiltration and Diffusion Systems in WB233

6-Cell Crossflow Reverse Osmosis (RO) System (800 psi max) in WB233

3-Cell Crossflow High-Pressure Reverse Osmosis (HPRO) system (2175 psi max) in WB366 (soon to be 6-cell!)

Pure-Gas Membrane Gas Filtration System in WB366

3x Diffusion Cells and Stir Plates from PermeGear in WB233

3D Printers

Other Equipment

An automated NIPS membrane fabrication platform integrating an (left to right) Opentrons OT-2 liquid handler, a UFactory xArm7 robotic arm, and a TestResources 140 mechanical tester for closed-loop membrane fabrication and characterization.

A Biologic VMP-300 potentiostat used for electrochemical experiments. It can run up to 3 experiments at once, with a max voltage of 14V and a max current of 4A. It is also capable of running high resolution Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) up to 7MHz.

Micro-Centrifuge, Vortexer, and Shaker Platforms

Fume Hood Spaces

Old and dirty, but they work!

Fume hoods in WB366, with a Schlenk Line (left)

Fume hoods in WB364, mostly used for our thiol-based synthesis experiments (stinky!)

Storage

Office Spaces

Where our grad students get the work done!