Morphological Characterization of Hemodialysis Hollow Fiber Membranes
摘要
Chronic kidney disease (CKD) severely impairs the renal system´s blood-filtering function. In advanced stages of this disease, patients require replacement therapies, such as hemodialysis, which rely on the use of specialized membranes capable of removing cellular waste substances without altering the essential properties of blood. A critical feature of these membranes, commonly manufactured as hollow fibers, is their porosity and pore size distribution, as these properties determine their filtration efficiency. We fabricated polysulfone hollow fiber membranes by phase inversion and characterized their morphology to assess how manufacturing conditions (e.g., polymer concentration, coagulation bath temperature, flow rate) influence pore structure and pore-size distribution. We analyzed membrane morphology by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), with pore-size and distribution quantified using ImageJ. Statistical analysis (ANOVA with Tukey's post hoc test) assessed how manufacturing parameters influenced pore morphology. Manufacturing parameters critically shaped hollow fiber pore morphology, enabling tunable pore structures with macropores (5–55 μm) and micropores (0.32–2 μm). Analysis revealed the pore size distribution showed greater variability and statistically significant differences in micropore range, primarily controlled by thermal shock and flow rate. The results show that precise control of manufacturing parameters allows designing membranes with optimized pore morphology for hemodialysis applications.