Hypercrosslinked Polymers for Volatile and Very Volatile Organic Compound Capture Beyond Commercial Benchmarks

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Polymer Chemistry
• Environmental Science

Background:

• Effective capture of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and very volatile organic compounds (VVOCs) is critical for indoor air quality, environmental monitoring, and emission regulation.
• Challenges in VVOC adsorption include their low boiling points, high vapor pressures, and adsorbent susceptibility to water sorption.
• Hypercrosslinked polymers offer a potential solution due to their tunable properties and high surface areas.

Purpose of the Study:

• To systematically investigate the role of chemical functionality in hypercrosslinked polymers for (V)VOC capture.
• To evaluate the adsorption performance of these polymers under realistic, including humid, operational conditions.
• To compare the performance of functionalized hypercrosslinked polymers against a commercial benchmark sorbent.

Main Methods:

• Synthesis and characterization of fluorene-based hypercrosslinked polymers with various heteroatom substituents (C, N, O, S, SO2).
• Evaluation of adsorption performance using thermodesorption- and headspace-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry.
• Testing under both dry and humid atmospheric conditions with a ten-component (V)VOC mixture.

Main Results:

• Synthesized polymers exhibited high thermal stability, surface areas up to 1600 m²·g⁻¹, and micro-/mesoporous architectures.
• Hypercrosslinked polymers outperformed a commercial sorbent in (V)VOC uptake under both dry and humid conditions.
• The amine-functionalized network demonstrated the broadest analyte retention range, even in the presence of water vapor.

Conclusions:

• Polymer chemistry significantly influences sorption behavior for (V)VOC capture.
• Hypercrosslinked polymers are high-performance, tuneable alternatives to current commercial sorbents for capturing volatile analytes.
• The amine-functionalized hypercrosslinked polymer shows particular promise for applications requiring robust performance in humid environments.