An In Situ Procedure for the Preparation of Zeolitic Imidazolate Framework‐8 Polyacrylamide Hydrogel for Adsorption of Aqueous Pollutants

Abstract Metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) have attracted a lot of attention in recent years because of their high surface area and tunable porosities, which allow them to serve as excellent and versatile adsorbents for pollutants in water/wastewater. One of the demanding challenges of using MOFs is that they need to be supported on a substrate or in a matrix to be easier to operate and more efficiently used. This work presents a simple in situ method of synthesizing one of the most popular MOF particles, zeolitic imidazolate framework 8 (ZIF‐8), in a polyacrylamide (PAM) hydrogel using a zinc hydroxide PAM composite as a precursor gel. Characterization of the prepared ZIF‐8 PAM composite hydrogel by scanning electron microscope, energy‐dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy, X‐ray powder diffraction, Fourier‐transform infrared spectroscopy, and X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy confirms the successful synthesis of ZIF‐8 particles on the surface of and inside the PAM hydrogel. To test the potential of this novel material as an adsorbent, its ability to remove humic acid (HA), a model organic pollutant, from water is evaluated. The maximum adsorption capacity for HA is found to be 111.5 ± 3.0 mg g −1 ZIF‐8, comparable to the performance of other adsorbents for the removal of HA.