Pyrene Bearing Azo-Functionalized Porous Nanofibers for CO2 Separation and Toxic Metal Cation Sensing

Oussama M El-Kadri; Tsemre-Dingel Tessema; Ruaa M Almotawa; Ravi K Arvapally; Mohammad H Al-Sayah; Mohammad A Omary; Hani M El-Kaderi

doi:10.1021/acsomega.8b01920

Pyrene Bearing Azo-Functionalized Porous Nanofibers for CO₂ Separation and Toxic Metal Cation Sensing

ACS Omega. 2018 Nov 14;3(11):15510-15518. doi: 10.1021/acsomega.8b01920. eCollection 2018 Nov 30.

Authors

Oussama M El-Kadri^{1

1}, Tsemre-Dingel Tessema², Ruaa M Almotawa³, Ravi K Arvapally³, Mohammad H Al-Sayah^{1

1}, Mohammad A Omary^{3

4}, Hani M El-Kaderi²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences, and Materials Science and Engineering Research Institute, American University of Sharjah, P.O. Box 26666, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.
² Department of Chemistry, Virginia Commonwealth University, 1001 W. Main Street, Richmond, Virginia 23284-2006, United States.
³ Department of Chemistry and Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Processes Institute (AMMPI), University of North Texas, 1155 Union Circle #305070, Denton, Texas 76203, United States.
⁴ Institute of New Energy, Science Hall, 1003 Shangbu Road, Shenzhen 518031, China.

Abstract

A novel luminescent azo-linked polymer (ALP) has been constructed from 1,3,6,8-tetra(4-aminophenyl)pyrene using a copper(I)-catalyzed oxidative homocoupling reaction. The polymer displays high porosity with a Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface area of 1259 m² g^-1 and narrow pore size distribution (1.06 nm) and is able to take up a significant amount of CO₂ (2.89 mmol g^-1) at 298 K and 1.00 bar with a high isosteric heat of adsorption of 27.5 kJ mol^-1. Selectivity studies applying the ideal adsorbed solution theory revealed that the novel polymer has moderately good selectivities for CO₂/N₂ (55.1) and CO₂/CH₄ (10.9). Furthermore, the ALP shows fluorescence quenching in the presence of Hg²⁺, Pb²⁺, Tl⁺, and Al³⁺ ions. Compared with these ions, the ALP showed no sensitivity to light metal ions such as Na⁺, K⁺, and Ca²⁺ in ethanol-water solution, clearly indicating the high selectivity of the ALP toward heavy metal ions. The exceptional physiochemical stability, high porosity, and strong luminescence make this polymer an excellent candidate as a fluorescent chemical sensor for the detection of heavy metal ions.