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Molecularly imprinted polymers on the surface of porous carbon microspheres for capturing dibenzothiophene

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Abstract

A molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) was deposited on the surface of porous carbon microspheres (MIP/p-CMSs) to obtain a sorbent for dibenzothiophene (DBT). The MIP/p-CMSs were synthesized by grafting polymerization and surface molecular imprinting using DBT as the template molecule, methacrylic acid as the functional monomer, and ethylene glycol dimethacrylate as the cross-linker. Field emission scanning electron microscopy and FTIR were used to characterize the morphology and structure of the sorbent. Additional studies included static adsorption experiments in terms of kinetics, isotherms and selective recognition adsorption. The results indicate that MIP/p-CMSs possess good recognition selectivity and affinity for DBT. The adsorption capacity reaches 123.7 mg g−1 after 150 min. The adsorption on the heterogeneous MIP/p-CMSs was modeled with pseudo-second-order and Langmuir-Freundlich isotherms. Regeneration tests show the MIP/p-CMSs to be 10 times reusable without significant loss in adsorption capacity. The method was applied to capturing DBT from (spiked) gasoline and the results confirmed its applicability. Recoveries ranged from 93.2 % to 97.7 %.

A molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) was synthesized on the surface of porous carbon microspheres (p-CMSs) by using dibenzothiophene as the template. It offers high binding capacity and selectivity for removal of sulfur-containing compounds from fuel oils.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (21176169), International Science & Technology Cooperation Program of China (2012DFR50460), Shanxi Provincial Key Innovative Research Team in Science and Technology (2015013002-10), Postgraduate Innovation Program of Shanxi Province (20123029) and Special/Youth Foundation of Taiyuan University of Technology (2014TD015).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Interface Science and Engineering in Advanced Materials, Ministry of Education, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, 030024, China

    Weifeng Liu, Lei Qin, Weiping Shi, Lin Chen, Yongzhen Yang, Xuguang Liu & Bingshe Xu

  2. College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, 030024, China

    Lei Qin, Weiping Shi & Xuguang Liu

  3. Research Center on Advanced Materials Science and Technology, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, Shanxi, 030024, China

    Weifeng Liu, Lin Chen, Yongzhen Yang & Bingshe Xu

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  1. Weifeng Liu
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  2. Lei Qin
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  3. Weiping Shi
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  4. Lin Chen
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Correspondence to Yongzhen Yang or Xuguang Liu.

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Liu, W., Qin, L., Shi, W. et al. Molecularly imprinted polymers on the surface of porous carbon microspheres for capturing dibenzothiophene. Microchim Acta 183, 1153–1160 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-016-1746-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00604-016-1746-2

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