AbstractThe quantitatively amidoximated poly(4‐vinylpyridine‐co‐acrylonitrile) (4VNX) could be cast with divinyl sulfone as a crosslinking agent to form membranes for reverse osmosis. They were stronger than a cellulose acetate membrane when dried for more then 45 min at 80°C, most balanced in their performance when 4VNX was composed of about 60 mol acrylonitrile amidoxime, and highly rejected NaCl, CoCl2, NiCl2, and phenol as well at pH 12. They were superior in the performance to the membranes prepared from the amidoximes of poly(2,4‐diamino‐6‐vinyl‐s‐triazine‐co‐acrylonitrile) and polyacrylonitrile. 4VNX membranes prepared by drying for about 30 min were capable of separating NaCl and transition metals under lower pressures because of great differences in rejections between NaCl and those metals. Potential use of 4VNX membranes in ultrafiltration was demonstrated, particularly to the effect that flux was enhanced while the rejection differences were hardly changed. It was also demonstrated that the isolation of transition metals of considerably different uptake from their mixture could be achieved by breakthrough of the column packed with divinylbenzene‐
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