Novel robust cellulose-based foam with pH and light dual-response for oil recovery

Abstract

We fabricated pH and light dual-responsive adsorption materials which could induce the transition of surface wettability between hydrophobicity and hydrophilicity by using ATRP. The structure and morphology of adsorption materials were confirmed by ATR-FTIR, XPS, TGA and SEM. It showed that the modified cellulose (CE)-based foam was hydrophobic, which can adsorb a range of oils and organic solvents in water under pH= 7.0 or visible light irradiation (λ>500 nm). Meanwhile, the wettability of robust CE-based foam can convert hydrophobicity into hydrophilicity and underwater oleophobicity under pH= 3.0 or UV irradiation (λ = 365 nm), giving rise to release oils and organic solvents. Most important of all, the adsorption and desorption processes of the modified CE-based foam could be switched by external stimuli. Furthermore, the modified CE-based foam was not damaged and still retained original performance after reversible cycle repeated for many times with variation of surface wettability. In short, it indicates that CE-based foam materials with switchable surface wettability are new responsive absorbent materials and have owned potential application in the treatment of oil recovery.

Keywords

cellulose-based foam / dual-responsive / adsorption materials / switchable wettability / oil recovery

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported financially by funding from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 21367022 and 51662036) and the Bingtuan Innovation Team in Key Areas (2015BD003).

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