A series of cellulose/chitosan blend porous spheres were prepared by dropping cum phase separation from 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium acetate/dimethylformamide based solutions via coagulation in water. Special attention was given to the investigation of the phase separation process initiated with water in relation with the different chitosan content in polymer solutions. The increase of the chitosan fraction in the biopolymer solution led to a destabilization of the solutions by lower amounts of water. Both viscosity of the polymer and stability of the solution played a very important role to the spheres structure formation. It was observed that the SBET seems to decrease at the increase of the chitosan content in the porous material. Despite the decrease of porosity, the increase of the chitosan fraction in the blend had a beneficial influence on the adsorber properties of the spheres, due to the amino groups in the chitosan units.
Keywords: Adsorbent; Cellulose; Chitosan; Ionic liquid; Non-solvent induced phase separation; Water purification.
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