Ordered mesoporous carbon/Nafion as a versatile and selective solid-phase microextraction coating

• Published in: Journal of Chromatography A 2014-10, Vol.1365, p.29-34
• Main Authors: Zeng, Jingbin, Zhao, Cuiying, Chen, Jingjing, Subhan, Fazle, Luo, Liwen, Yu, Jianfeng, Cui, Bingwen, Xing, Wei, Chen, Xi, Yan, Zifeng
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Amines; Analytical chemistry; Applied sciences; Binders; Carbon; Chemistry; Chromatographic methods and physical methods associated with chromatography; Coating; Crude oil; Crude oil, natural gas and petroleum products; Energy; Exact sciences and technology; Extraction; Fuels; Gas chromatographic methods; Nafion; Ordered mesoporous carbon; Porosity; Prospecting and production of crude oil, natural gas, oil shales and tar sands; Solid-phase microextraction; Surface area
• ISSN: 0021-9673
• DOI: 10.1016/j.chroma.2014.08.094

•Highly ordered mesoporous carbon (OMC) was synthesized.•The as-synthesized OMC was of high surface area and uniform mesoporous structure.•The OMC was prepared as an SPME coating using Nafion as a binder.•The OMC/Nafion coating exhibited excellent extraction selectivity towards aromatic compounds. In this study, ordered mesoporous carbon (OMC) with large surface area (1019m2g−1), uniform mesoporous structure (pore size distribution centering at 4.2nm) and large pore volume (1.46cm3g−1) was synthesized using 2D hexagonally mesoporous silica MSU-H as the hard template and sucrose as the carbon precursor. The as-synthesized OMC was immobilized onto a stainless steel wire using Nafion as a binder to prepare an OMC/Nafion solid-phase microextraction (SPME) coating. The extraction characteristics of the OMC/Nafion coating were extensively investigated using a wide range of analytes including non-polar (light petroleum and benzene homologues) and polar compounds (amines and phenols). The OMC/Nafion coating exhibited much better extraction efficiency towards all selected analytes than that of a multi-walled carbon nanotubes/Nafion coating with similar length and thickness, which is ascribed to its high surface area, well-ordered mesoporous structure and large pore volume. When the OMC/Nafion coating was used to extract a mixture containing various kinds of analytes, it possessed excellent extraction selectivity towards aromatic non-polar compounds. In addition, the feasibility of the OMC/Nafion coating for application in electrochemically enhanced SPME was demonstrated using protonated amines as model analytes.