Preparation of molecularly imprinted polymers for heptachlor: An organochlorine pesticide

Background: Molecular Imprinting technology is a promising technique for creating recognition elements for selected compounds and has been successfully applied for synthesis of Environmental pollutants such as pesticides. Aim: Synthetic binding polymers were prepared by non-covalent imprinting technique using bulk polymerization method for heptachlor, which is an organochlorine pesticide. Materials and Methods: Three functional monomers and 2 cross-linkers were used for molecular imprinting. The molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) obtained were subsequently characterized in detail with rebinding investigation using batch rebinding. The results indicate that the imprinting was successfully done for heptachlor using methacrylic acid (MAA) as functional monomer and ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EDMA) as cross-linker. Results: The affinity order from rebinding results for the 3 polymers is heptachlor-co-MAA-co-EDMA > heptachlor-co-4-VP-co-DVB > heptachlor-co-Styrene-co-DVB. UV-visible spectrophotometric study for interaction of heptachlor with MAA in pre-polymerization mixture suggests the formation of H-bonding also contributing to the formation of good imprint. Conclusion: Molecular Imprinted polymers can be used as detection systems and as clean up materials for pesticides.