Under-oil superhydrophilic salt particle filter for the efficient separation of water-in-oil emulsions

Abstract

In this study, a surfactant stabilized water-in-oil emulsion has been successfully separated by using only NaCl particles as a filter. This novel strategy is suitable for continuous filtration of a large quantity of water-in-oil emulsion with a volume of up to 1500 mL. Moreover, a filtration flux of up to 40 000 L m⁻² h⁻¹ is reported, which is around ten times higher than the conventional filtration methods.