Preparation and application of monodisperse, highly cross-linked, and porous polystyrene microspheres for dye removal

The porous materials as adsorbents play an important role in dye removal. In this paper, monodisperse, highly cross-linked porous microspheres with a specific surface area of 255.83 m²/g and average pore size of 8.5 nm were synthesized by seed swollen emulsion polymerization. The sulfonation reactions of porous microspheres were carried out to improve the hydrophilic performance and electronegativity of the microsphere surface. Cationic methylene blue (MB) and anionic methyl orange (MO) were employed as simulated dye wastewater to investigate the adsorption kinetics of porous microspheres. The experimental results demonstrate that porous sulfonate microspheres possess selective adsorption for MB due to electrostatic interaction between the negative charges on the surface of microspheres and the positive charges of MB molecules. Porous microspheres exhibit an adsorption capacity of 313.125 mg/g after 2 h. The adsorption kinetics of MB dyes in porous microspheres follow a pseudo-second-order model.