Supermacroporous polymer monolith prepared with polymeric porogens via viscoelastic phase separation for capillary electrochromatography

Abstract

Supermacroporous poly(methacrylic acid-butyl methacrylate-ethylene glycol dimethacrylate) monoliths with the pore size up to 5–10μm were successfully prepared in a ternary polymeric porogens utilizing viscoelastic effect. High concentration (over 20mg/mL) of polystyrene (PS) in porogen was used to achieve the desirable characteristics of the monolithic capillary. Modification of the co-porogen composition, i.e., the content of dimethyl sulfoxide and isooctane, enabled tailoring of the supermacropore structure with a wide range of pore size. The effects of the amount of polymer porogen and molecular weights of PS on the formation of supermacropore were also studied. In preliminary applications, the separations of alkyl phenones and alkylbenzenes were achieved on the supermacropore columns using a mode of capillary electrochromatography. The study demonstrated successfully the ability of polymer porogen to form supermacropore monolith via viscoelastic phase separation