A new polymer monolith with three modes of reverse-phase, hydrophilic and cation-exchange interaction was synthesized in 100 μm i.d. fused-silica capillary by in situ polymerization procedure. The pre-polymerization mixture consisted of glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) and 4-vinylphenylboronic acid (VPBA) as bifunctional monomers, ethylene dimethacrylate (EDMA) as crosslinker, 1,4-butanediol (BDO) and diethylene glycol (DEG) as binary porogenic solvents, and azobisisobutyronitrile (AIBN) as initiator. The resulting poly(GMA-co-VPBA-co-EDMA) monolith showed a relatively homogeneous monolithic structure, good permeability and mechanical stability. Different ratios of monomers and porogens were used for optimizing the properties of monolithic column. The column performance was assessed by the separation of a series of neutral solutes, charge solutes, phenols and anilines. Compared with poly(GMA-co-EDMA) monolith, the proposed monolith exhibited more flexible adjustment of selectivity in terms of hydrophobic, hydrophilic, as well as cation-exchange interaction in the same chromatographic conditions. High column efficiencies for benzene derivatives with 70,000–102,000 theoretical plates/m could be obtained at a linear velocity of 0.265 mm/s. The run-to-run, column-to-column, and batch-to-batch repeatabilities of the retention times were less than 8.23%. Additionally, the purposed monolith was also applied to efficient separation of alkaloids and proteins for demonstrating its potential in biomolecule separation.
Hui Mao,Meihong Liu,Zhenqian Cao,Chunguang Ji,Ying Sun,Daliang Liu,Shuyao Wu,Yu Zhang,Xi-Ming Song
Novel poly(4-vinylphenylboronic acid) (P4VPBA) functionalized polypyrrole/graphene oxide (PPy/GO) nanosheets , which combined the advantages of GO, PPy and PBA groups, were successfully prepared by a simple polymerization of 4-vinylphenylboronic acid (4VPBA) on the surface of pre-treated PPy/GO containing vinyl groups. Because of the synergistic effects of GO with excellent 2D structures and large surface area, PPy with good electronic conductivity and PBA with high recognition capability, P4VPBA/PPy/GO modified glassy carbon electrode presented excellent electrochemical sensing capabilities toward catechol (CC) and hydroquinone (HQ) with good stability, high sensitivity and selectivity, especially giving a large anodic peak potential difference between CC and HQ enough to well distinguish and simultaneously determine the two dihydroxybenzene isomers in their mixture. It is found that PBA groups on the surface of P4VPBA/PPy/GO nanosheets played an essential role for the discrimination and simultaneous electrochemical determination of CC and HQ, which may be due to the selective formation of stable cyclic esters by the covalent interaction between PBA groups and related molecules with a cis -diol in an alkaline aqueous solution. Therefore, P4VPBA/PPy/GO nanosheets can act as a good electrode material for building a steady electrochemical sensor for detecting the two dihydroxybenzene isomers with high sensitivity and selectivity.