Porous organic polymers with different pore structures for sensitive solid-phase microextraction of environmental organic pollutants

Abstract

Adsorption capacity is the major sensitivity-limited factor in solid-phase microextraction. Due to its light-weight properties, large specific surface area and high porosity, especially tunable pore structures, the utilization of porous organic polymers as solid-phase microextraction adsorbents has attracting researchers' attentions. However, these works mostly concentrated on the utilization of specific porous organic polymers for preparing high-performance solid-phase microextraction coatings. The relationship between pore structures and adsorption performance of the porous organic polymers still remain unclear. Herein, three porous organic polymers with similar properties but different pore distributions were prepared by condensation polymerization reaction of phloroglucinol and terephthalaldehyde, which were fabricated as solid-phase microextraction coatings subsequently. The adsorption capacity of the porous organic polymers-coated fibers were evaluated by using benzene and its derivatives (i.e.,benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and m-xylene) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons as the target analytes. The results showed that the different adsorption performance of these porous organic polymers was mainly caused by their different pore volumes instead of their surface areas or pore sizes. Finally, the proposed method by using the mesoporous organic polymer coating was successfully applied to the determination of benzene and its derivatives in environmental water samples. As for analytical performance, high pre-concentration factors (74–2984), satisfactory relative recoveries (94.5 ± 18.5–116.9 ± 12.5%), intraday precision (2.44–5.34%), inter-day precision (4.62–7.02%), low limit of detections (LODs, 0.10–0.29 ng L−1) and limit of quantifications (LOQs, 0.33–0.96 ng L−1) were achieved under the optimal conditions. This study provides an important idea in the rational design of porous organic polymers for solid-phase microextraction or other adsorption applications.