Hydrophilic crosslinking agent-incorporated magnetic imprinted materials with enhanced selectivity for sulfamethazine adsorption

In this study, magnetic molecularly imprinted polymers (MMIPs) with enhanced selectivity were synthesized using sulfamethazine (SMZ) as template molecule and hydrophilic triethylene glycol dimethacrylate as crosslinker. Compared with that of imprinted polymers (MMIPs@EGDMA) prepared with commonly used ethylene glycol dimethacrylate, MMIPs with increased hydrophilicity could achieve efficient adsorption and preferred binding ability for template SMZ (selectivity factor increased from 0.9 of MMIPs@EGDMA to 1.9) in the presence of structural analogues with significant similarities (i.e. sulfamonomethoxine). Under the optimal extraction conditions, the developed MMIPs-MSPE-HPLC-DAD method showed wide linear range (1.6-250 mu g/L), low detection limit (0.44 mu g/L) and satisfactory precision (RSD < 7%). The proposed strategy offers a potential and simple way to obtain imprinted polymers with high recognition capability, providing a perspective method in the accurate determination of SMZ in environmental water.