Functional nano molecularly imprinted polymer for the detection of Penicillin G in pharmaceutical samples

In the present study, we demonstrated the synthesis of nanosized molecularly imprinted polymer (nanoMIP) particles via a miniemulsion polymerization strategy for the selective recognition of Penicillin G element, a beta-lactam antibiotic (PenG-nanoMIP). The PenG-nanoMIP probe was developed by the mixture of functional monomer, methacrylic acid (MAA) and crosslinking agent, ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA). The pre-polymerization of monomer-template mixture was emulsified into miniemulsion via sonication where the PenG-nanoMIP particles were obtained with an average diameter of 60-70 nm. Also, various MIPs were formed by taking different combinations of monomer to crosslinker and among all, the MIP formed with a ratio of 6:24 was chosen as the optimum formulation. In addition, the PenG-nanoMIP probe has been characterized thoroughly for the surface functionality (FTIR), morphological changes (FESEM-EDX), and particles diameter. Finally, the batch rebinding tests via UV-Vis were conducted to investigate that the PenG-nanoMIP 2 has the greatest binding capacity with 4.37 mg/g as compared to PenG-nanoMIP 1 and PenG-nanoMIP 3 having the binding capacities of 3.33 mg/g and 3.62 mg/g respectively. Based on the analysis, it can be suggested that PenG-nanoMIP 2 has offered the highest binding and selectivity for PenG.

Automated summary

In this study, nanosized molecularly imprinted polymer (nanoMIP) particles were synthesized via a miniemulsion polymerization strategy for the selective recognition of Penicillin G element, a beta-lactam antibiotic (PenG-nanoMIP). The PenG-nanoMIP probe was developed using a mixture of the functional monomer methacrylic acid (MAA) and crosslinking agent ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA). The PenG-nanoMIP particles were obtained with an average diameter of 60-70 nm through the emulsification of the pre-polymerization mixture into miniemulsion via sonication. Furthermore, batch rebinding tests revealed that PenG-nanoMIP 2 exhibited the highest binding capacity of 4.37 mg/g compared to PenG-nanoMIP 1 and PenG-nanoMIP 3 with binding capacities of 3.33 mg/g and 3.62 mg/g, respectively.