LAUSR

The structural stability and mechanical strength of hydrophilic polymer nanofiber (NF) membranes are relatively low, because of the creep effect of polymer chain when swelling in water for a long time, which lead to a poor reusability in the fields of water treatment. In this work, we demonstrated a facile and green strategy for preparing eco-friendly hydrophilic nanofibrous membranes with excellent reusability and recyclability that could separate oil-in-water emulsion in practical conditions by using bio-based chitin nanowhiskers (ChNWs) as reinforcement and “co-crosslinking hub” for hydrophilic nanofiber matrix. The as-prepared membranes exhibited very good separation performance, with a separation flux of 1100–1300 L m–2 h–1 and a separation efficiency of >99.5%. The reusability and recyclability of the membranes were evaluated and had proved to be robust enough to effectively separate emulsions after recycling at least 5 times. Moreover, the NF membranes were capable of effectively separating oil-in-...