Fabrication of dual responsive imprinted materials of magnetic and solvent and their solvent-regulated binding performance for bisphenol A

Facile and versatile adsorbents with fast separation and tunable adsorption performance based on molecularly imprinting polymers hold significant potential to improve the efficiency of sample pretreatment. In this work, a type of magnetic imprinted materials (SMMIPs) was prepared, using magnetic multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs@Fe3O4) as carrier, triethylene glycol dimethacrylate as cross-linker, and acryloyl-modified beta-cyclodextrin (beta-CD-MA) as functional monomer, which can interact with bisphenol A (BPA) by host-guest interaction. MWNTs@Fe3O4 not only was served as substrates, but also contributed to the immobilization of beta-CD-MA/BPA complex on their surface due to hydrogen bonding interaction between pre-assembly complex and carboxyl groups on its surface. Taking advantages of excellent solvent-responsiveness, SMMIPs can easily adsorb templates BPA in water with the adsorption capacity of 13.84 mg/g while desorb the adsorbed BPA in organic solvents (i.e. methanol, acetonitrile, ethanol and isopropanol) without the aid of acid. Significantly, even after reuse in successive four cycles, SMMIPs maintained high adsorption. Under the optimal extraction conditions, the proposed SMMIPs were successfully employed for the determination and separation of trace BPA in environmental waters and orange juice, exhibiting great potential in the determination of BPA in environmental and food samples.

Automated summary

In this study, a type of magnetic imprinted materials (SMMIPs) with excellent solvent-responsiveness were prepared, which can easily adsorb templates BPA in water and desorb the adsorbed BPA in organic solvents without the aid of acid. The SMMIPs maintained high adsorption even after reuse in successive four cycles, and were successfully employed for the determination and separation of trace BPA in environmental waters and orange juice.