One-pot fabrication of nanoporous polymer decorated materials: from oil-collecting devices to high-efficiency emulsion separation

Developing a facile and versatile strategy for rapidly separating complex oil-watermixtures and collecting the oil content simultaneously is extremely important. Therefore, we report robust porous polydivinylbenzene (PDVB)-PDMS decorated superhydrophobic melamine sponge and filter membrane synthesis via a one-pot and environmentally friendly method. A firm hierarchically nanoporous coating was formed with the growth of PDVB cross-linking networks in situ on the substrates through polymerization in the presence of a PDMS adhesive. Compared with most oil absorbents suffering from limited absorption capacity and complicated oil recovery processes, the prepared superhydrophobic melamine sponges not only show repeated oil-sorption capacity but also can be used as oil-collecting devices to immediately collect oils in situ on a large scale from water surfaces. Thus, oil-water separation and oil collection were realized simultaneously via the facile oil-collecting device which significantly reduces ecological impact and loss of energy and simplifies oil-spill cleanup processes. Moreover, the decorated sponge exhibits mechanical and chemical stability, which is capable of separating complex oil/water systems (corrosive aqueous solutions, cold or hot water and even extremely turbulent water). Importantly, the porous polymer modified membrane is able to separate various surfactant-stabilized water-in-oil emulsions with a high separation efficiency.