Effects of prepolymerization on surface molecularly imprinted polymer for rapid separation and analysis of sulfonamides in water

This work systematically investigated the effects of prepolymerization on the property of multi-templates surface molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP), which was utilized to quickly and simultaneously separate and detect six sulfonamides (sulfadiazine, sulfathiazole, sulfamerazine, sulfamethazine, sulfamethoxazole and sulfadoxine) in real waters. The MIPs were prepared using the six sulfonamides as the templates, mesoporous silica supported onto the surface of magnetic graphene oxide as the carrier and 4-vinylbenzoic as the functional monomer, with and without prepolymerization of templates with functional monomer. The preparation and adsorption conditions were optimized. It was found that the adsorption capacities of the selected six sulfonamides on the MIP (pre) prepared with prepolymerization were apparently higher than those on the MIP (no pre) synthesized without prepolymerization. Subsequently, the MIPs were utilized as adsorbents for SPE of these sulfonamides, and coupled with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) for the determination of sulfonamides. The developed analytical method showed outstanding applicability for the detection of trace sulfonamides in real water samples. The spiked recoveries and relative standard deviations (RSDs) of the six sulfonamides using MIP (no pre) and MIP (pre) were 73.34–99.43% and 87.37–102.34%, 2.28–7.77% and 3.18–6.49%, respectively.