Nitrogen-rich based conjugated microporous polymers for highly efficient adsorption and removal of COVID-19 antiviral drug chloroquine phosphate from environmental waters

Xiao-Xing Wang; Lu Liu; Qi-Feng Li; Hua Xiao; Ming-Lin Wang; Hai-Chen Tu; Jin-Ming Lin; Ru-Song Zhao

doi:10.1016/j.seppur.2022.122517

Nitrogen-rich based conjugated microporous polymers for highly efficient adsorption and removal of COVID-19 antiviral drug chloroquine phosphate from environmental waters

Sep Purif Technol. 2023 Jan 15:305:122517. doi: 10.1016/j.seppur.2022.122517. Epub 2022 Nov 1.

Authors

Xiao-Xing Wang^{1

2}, Lu Liu¹, Qi-Feng Li³, Hua Xiao¹, Ming-Lin Wang², Hai-Chen Tu¹, Jin-Ming Lin⁴, Ru-Song Zhao¹

Affiliations

¹ Qilu University of Technology (Shandong Academy of Sciences), Shandong Analysis and Test Center, Key Laboratory for Applied Technology of Sophisticated Analytical Instruments of Shandong Province, Jinan 250014, China.
² College of Food Science and Engineering, Shandong Agricultural University, Taian 271018, China.
³ Department of Pharmaceutical Engineering, Shandong Medicine Technician College, Taian 271000, China.
⁴ Department of Chemistry, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China.

Abstract

Chloroquine phosphate (CQP) has been suggested as an important and effective clinical reliever medication for the 2019 coronavirus (COVID-19). Nevertheless, its excessive use will inevitably cause irreparable damage to the entire ecosystem, thereby posing a considerable environmental safety concern. Hence, the development of highly-efficient methods of removing CQP from water pollution sources, e.g., effluents from hospitals and pharmaceutical factories is significant. This study reported the fabrication of novel C-N bond linked conjugated microporous polymers (CMPs) (BPT-DMB-CMP) with multiple nitrogen-rich anchoring sites for the quick and efficient removal of CQP from aqueous solutions. The irreversible covalent C-N bond linked in the internal framework of BPT-DMB-CMP endowed it with good chemical stability and excellent adsorbent regeneration. With its predesigned functional groups (i.e., rich N-H bonds, triazine rings, and benzene rings) and large area surface (1,019.89 m²·g^-1), BPT-DMB-CMP demonstrated rapid adsorption kinetics (25 min) and an extraordinary adsorption capacity (334.70 mg·g^-1) for CQP, which is relatively higher than that of other adsorbents. The adsorption behavior of CQP on BPT-DMB-CMP corresponded with Liu model and mixed-order model. Based on the density functional theory (DFT) calculations, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and adsorption comparisons test, the halogen bonding, and hydrogen bonding cooperates with π - π, C - H···π interactions and size-matching effect in the CQP adsorption system on BPT-DMB-CMP. The excellent practicability for the removal of CQP from real wastewater samples verified the prospect of practical application of BPT-DMB-CMP. BPT-DMB-CMP exhibited the application potentials for the adsorption of other antiviral drugs. This work opens up an efficient, simple, and high adsorption capacity way for removal CQP.

Keywords: Adsorption; Chloroquine phosphate; Conjugated microporous polymers; Removal.