International Journal of Applied Chemistry. ISSN 0973-1792 Volume 12, Number 1 (2016) pp. 99-103 © Research India Publications http://www.ripublication.com 99 Characterization of hybrid membranes from sol –gel method on PVA/Chitosan polymer blend : Effect of silica hybrid nanocomposite on membrane structure Nurul Aida Sulaiman, Norin Zamiah Kassim Shaari, Norazah Abdul Rahman Department of Chemical and Process Engineering, Faculty of Chemical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia *corresponding email: norinzamiah@salam.uitm.edu.my Abstract— Hybrid membrane was prepared from polymer blend of PVA/Chitosan with tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) as the inorganic cross linker. In this report, characteristics of hybrid membrane were analyzed by contact angle analysis, their mechanical performance using tensile strength and their thermal stabilities using thermogravimetry analysis (TGA) with various concentrations of TEOS. The increase in TEOS concentration resulted in the improvement of the mechanical and thermal structure of the membrane. The addition of TEOS in the solution of membrane made the hybrid membrane more hydrophilic. The incorporation of 3wt% till 5wt% TEOS concentration was found to produce high flexibility and good thermal stability of hybrid membrane. Results obtained from this study are used for further development in the application of thin film composite membrane. Keywords— hybrid membrane ;sol –gel ;organic –inorganic polymer I. INTRODUCTION In recent years, membrane application process have received much attention as potential process for the separation water and gas [1]. The main advantages of membrane process compared with other separation unit are related to their faster operation, more effective process, and more economical than other conventional method [2]. On the other hand, they do not need any additives and can perform isothermally [2][3]. Due to their advantages, polymeric membranes for ultrafiltration, nanofiltration, pervaporation, gas separation, and fuel cells has been made for better performance on membrane technology [2].The major benefits from polymer membrane are low operational costs, relatively small footprint, and compliance with environmental regulations [2]. However, the polymer membranes efficiency decrease with time due to the chemical degradation, fouling, thermal instability, low fluxes and compaction [2]. Thus, polymer blending had been studied to solve the problem. It is one of the suitable ways to have a new material that has unique properties and has potential to be commercialized.This was due to by the realization that new molecules are not always required to meet the need for new materials because polymer blending usually can be implemented more rapidly and economically than the development of new materials [4]. The material of the membrane also has been improved by the interactions between blended polymer like poly(Vinyl Alcohol) (PVA) and chitosan (Cs) through hydrophobic side chain combination [4]. In principle, blending is an ideal technique for making optimum hydrophilicity in the hydrophobic membrane. Hydrophilicity of the synthetic polymers has great influence on the blend preparation and properties. Surface and bulk hydrophilicity of blended polymers affect mainly their biological behaviour. Many studies have been made by addition of nanoparticles or cross linker to form complex structure of the polymer blending. For instance, hybrid membrane is formed by the addition of inorganic cross linker like tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) as silica nano precursor in mixed organic – inorganic polymer membrane were formed polymer hybrid membrane. The combination of both organic and inorganic polymeric membranes as hybrid membrane was create an emerging research field and may contribute to solve some of the problems connected to each other’s [2]. There are number of papers showed the extensive applications of hybrid membrane and better performance of hybrid membrane compared to the other mixed polymer membrane [5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. However, hybrid membranes cannot be prepared by common methods to prevent any effects for overall membrane properties. Generally, there are three ways to produce hybrid membrane. The first is the sol–gel process. The second is the phase inversion method or the in situ blending method, and the third is in situ or interfacial polymerization [2]. The sol –gel method have been chosen as method to produce hybrid membrane in this studies. The sol – gel method can produce homogenous materials combination with high thermal stability, density and hardness [12][13][14]. Besides, Sol-gel is a suitable method for the preparation of oxide films from precursors containing alkoxysilyl groups through continuous reaction steps of hydrolysis and condensation [12]. The aim of this paper is to identify the characteristic of hybrid membrane prepared frompolymer blending PVA with