Phenolic hydroxyl functionalized hyper-crosslinked polymers and their efficient adsorption

Phenolic hydroxyl modified hyper-crosslinked polymers were synthesized according to two consecutive Friedel-Crafts reactions. The first Friedel-Crafts reaction grafted plentiful phenolic hydroxyl on the polymers, and the second Friedel-Crafts reaction inserted abundant methylene in the polymer chains. The resulting polymers had relatively high Brunauer-Emmet-Teller (BET) surface area (SBET) and pore volume (Vtotal). The adsorption experiments indicated that the intermediate polymer, namely, PS-CA (Polystyrene-Catechol), showed excellent adsorption for berberine hydrochloride (BBH) with the maximum capacity (qmax) of 505.42 mg/g at 298 K, and the electrostatic interaction, π-π stacking and hydrogen bonding were the main driving forces. Anhydrous alcohol could desorb 75.36% of the adsorbed BBH from the polymer. On the other hand, the final polymers owned much higher adsorption of aniline and β-naphthylamine due to the micropore-filling. The dynamic adsorption used Chinese herbs Coptidis rhizoma solution present that the dynamic capacity was 248.70 mg/g dry resin.