Hyper-Crosslinked Polymer Nanocomposites Containing Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles with Enhanced Adsorption Towards Polar Dyes

Marco Guerritore; Rachele Castaldo; Brigida Silvestri; Roberto Avolio; Mariacristina Cocca; Maria Emanuela Errico; Maurizio Avella; Gennaro Gentile; Veronica Ambrogi

doi:10.3390/polym12061388

Hyper-Crosslinked Polymer Nanocomposites Containing Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles with Enhanced Adsorption Towards Polar Dyes

Polymers (Basel). 2020 Jun 20;12(6):1388. doi: 10.3390/polym12061388.

Authors

Marco Guerritore¹, Rachele Castaldo², Brigida Silvestri¹, Roberto Avolio², Mariacristina Cocca², Maria Emanuela Errico², Maurizio Avella², Gennaro Gentile², Veronica Ambrogi^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemical, Materials and Production Engineering (DICMaPI)-University of Naples Federico II, P. le Tecchio 80, 80125 Napoli, Italy.
² National Research Council of Italy, Institute for Polymers Composites and Biomaterials (IPCB-CNR), Via Campi Flegrei 34, 80078 Pozzuoli (NA), Italy.

Abstract

The development of new styrene-based hyper-crosslinked nanocomposites (HCLN) containing mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSN) is reported here as a new strategy to obtain functional high surface area materials with an enhanced hydrophilic character. The HCLN composition, morphology and porous structure were analyzed using a multi-technique approach. The HCLN displayed a high surface area (above 1600 m²/g) and higher microporosity than the corresponding hyper-crosslinked neat resin. The enhanced adsorption properties of the HCLN towards polar organic dyes was demonstrated through the adsorption of a reactive dye, Remazol Brilliant Blue R (RB). In particular, the HCLN containing 5phr MSN showed the highest adsorption capacity of RB.

Keywords: adsorption; dyes; hyper-crosslinked resins; mesoporous silica nanoparticles.