Rational design of an ion-imprinted polymer for aqueous methylmercury sorption
Methylmercury (MeHg+) is a mercury species that is very toxic for humans, and its monitoring and sorption from environmental samples of water are a public health concern. In this work, a combination of theory and experiment was used to rationally synthesize an ion-imprinted polymer (IIP) with the ai...
| Autores: | , , , , , , , |
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| Tipo de recurso: | artículo |
| Estado: | Versión publicada |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2020 |
| País: | Brasil |
| Institución: | Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP) |
| Repositorio: | Repositório Institucional da UNESP |
| Idioma: | inglés |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:repositorio.unesp.br:11449/205607 |
| Acceso en línea: | http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nano10122541 http://hdl.handle.net/11449/205607 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Bulk polymerization Computational modelling Environmental analysis Imprinting technology Ion recognition Ionic imprinting polymers Mercury detection and removal Sample preparation Separation science Water analysis |
| Sumario: | Methylmercury (MeHg+) is a mercury species that is very toxic for humans, and its monitoring and sorption from environmental samples of water are a public health concern. In this work, a combination of theory and experiment was used to rationally synthesize an ion-imprinted polymer (IIP) with the aim of the extraction of MeHg+ from samples of water. Interactions among MeHg+ and possible reaction components in the pre-polymerization stage were studied by computational simulation using density functional theory. Accordingly, 2-mercaptobenzimidazole (MBI) and 2-mercaptobenzothiazole (MBT), acrylic acid (AA) and ethanol were predicted as excellent sulfhydryl ligands, a functional monomer and porogenic solvent, respectively. Characterization studies by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) revealed the obtention of porous materials with specific surface areas of 11 m2 g−1 (IIP–MBI–AA) and 5.3 m2 g−1 (IIP–MBT–AA). Under optimized conditions, the maximum adsorption capacities were 157 µg g−1 (for IIP–MBI–AA) and 457 µg g−1 (for IIP–MBT–AA). The IIP–MBT–AA was selected for further experiments and application, and the selectivity coefficients were MeHg+ /Hg2+ (0.86), MeHg+ /Cd2+ (260), MeHg+ /Pb2+ (288) and MeHg+ /Zn2+ (1510), highlighting the material’s high affinity for MeHg+. The IIP was successfully applied to the sorption of MeHg+ in river and tap water samples at environmentally relevant concentrations. |
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