Synthesis and characterization of molecularly imprinted polymers for the remediation of PCBs and dioxins in aqueous environments

This paper, reports on the approach devised to remediate water sources contaminated with PCBs and dioxins. The approach reported is based on the synthesis of highly selective molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs). The paper elaborates the materials, procedures and protocols devised and followed for the synthesis of MIPs. The characterization of the synthesized MIPs and NIPs were performed using a number of techniques, such as FTIR, SEM, etc. The FTIR results show a broad OH stretching vibration peaks associated with methacrylic acid carboxylic group (COOH). at 3710 cm(-1) for NIP and 3588 cm(-1) for MIP, -CH(2) stretching peak at 2953 cm(-1)for NIP, peaks due to the presence of methylene group in both MAA and EDMA appearing at 2951 cm(-1) for MIP. The carbonyl group C = O stretching peak was observed in both MIP and NIP at 1721 cm(-1) and this might have originated from MAA and EDMA respectively in both MIP and NIP. Weak combination bands from 1637 cm(-1) to 1249 cm(-1) and sharp bands at 1143 cm(-1) specifically on MIPs spectra indicated the presence of aromatic ring of the template. The surface area of MIP was found to be 74.0010 m(2)/g, thus larger than that for NIP which was 58.6519 m(2)/g due to the presence of cavities on MIPs. The fit of the Langmuir model was found to be r (2) = 0.5842 while Freundlich model were found to be r(2) = 0.3241, signifying that better correlation was with Langmuir than Freundlich.