Fabricating hypercrosslinked aromatic-rich starch urethane polymer with enhanced adsorption performance for separation of acetophenone and 1-phenylethanol

Starch-based urethane polymers hold great potential for adsorptive separation of acetophenone (AP) and 1-phenylethanol (PE), which coexist commonly in the petrochemical by-products. Yet, the overall adsorption performance was restricted due to the poor porosity of adsorbent. We herein applied external crosslinking strategy to fabricate hypercrosslinked aromatic-rich starch urethane polymer (HASUP) with large surface area. The structural evolution, including chemical state, porosity and morphology were observed through various characteristic techniques. The adsorption properties of AP and PE onto HASUP were investigated in both single and binary systems. Compared to its non-porous precursor, HASUP exhibited significantly higher overall adsorption capacity while maintaining the AP selectivity with varying compositions. The further static and dynamic adsorption assessments demonstrated that HASUP showed exceptional performance to separate AP and PE. And HASUP also exhibited excellent anti-interference ability and recyclability for selective adsorption of AP over PE. Furthermore, theoretical results indicated that the multiple interactions including hydrophobic, π-π, and hydrogen bonding interactions account for selective adsorption of AP. In combination with high surface area, this synergistic effect enhanced the adsorption strength, affording a high AP uptake for HASUP. This work may provide an insight for designing novel porous starch-based adsorbents with high performance. [Display omitted] •Porous HASUP was fabricated by external crosslinking strategy.•The enhanced adsorption ability came from high porosity and introduced active sites.•HASUP showed excellent performance for separation of AP and PE.•The adsorption was mainly driven by π-π and hydrogen bonding interactions.