Preparation of compressible polymer monoliths that contain mesopores capable of rapid oil–water separation

Abstract

This paper describes the design of mesoporous polymer monoliths via a bottom-up approach which are compressible as a biological sponge and provide the rapid separation of oil–water mixtures. The monolithic networks can be prepared in a large scale by a facile condensation polymerization under non-agitated conditions, and contain cyanovinylene repeating units that give rise to a self-assembled fibrous structure and intrinsic mesopores without the need for a template. The sponge-like, polymer network readily absorbed considerable amounts of diverse organic solvents within 60 s due to the internal designed pores, while excluding water. Most of the absorbates were removed from the wet materials by simply squeezing by hand, and additional washing and drying completely regenerated the original state of materials for reuse. In particular, we observed that the intrinsic mesoporosity enhanced absorption properties of the monoliths when compared with microporous, spongy monolith or melamine foam, and thus demonstrated the rapid, selective separation of a model oil spill under water or on top of water.