Freshwater has become a strategic resource, which has severely impacted on the development of the sustainable development of the world in the future and the enhancement of the people living standard of our nation. Forward osmosis emerged as one of the emerging water purification and desalination technology, and it has attracted much attention. Forward osmosis membranes as the core of the forward osmosis technology have sparked a new round of research boom. The recent developments in forward osmosis membranes according to the separation performance are reviewed. This paper focus concentration on the membrane preparation methods, introducing the membrane materials, the membrane structure and the membrane performance in detail, mainly including phase inversion forward osmosis membranes, thin film composite forward osmosis membranes and chemically modified membranes. The applications of forward osmosis technology are introduced briefly. Finally, bright prospect as well as challenges on the forward osmosis membranes deserve to be further investigated.

Contents
1 Introduction
2 The characteristics and development process of forward osmosis membranes
3 The research progress of the forward osmosis membranes
3.1 Phase inversion forward osmosis membranes
3.2 The thin film composite forward osmosis membranes
3.3 Chemically modified forward osmosis membranes
4 Conclusion