Reusable ionic liquid‐functionalized polystyrene for the highly efficient removal of sulfadiazine sodium

The extensive use of sulfonamides has caused serious ecotoxicological effects, sulfonamide antibiotics are difficult to remove when they are in their anionic form. In this work, a novel polystyrene supported ionic liquid (PS‐CH 2 ‐[TSiIm][Cl]) material was prepared for the effective removal of sulfadiazine sodium (SDS). Results showed that the adsorption efficiency maintained relatively stable and high in a wide pH (6–10) and temperature (25–70 °C) ranges. SDS adsorbed onto the PS‐CH 2 ‐[TSiIm][Cl] could be well evaluated by Langmuir model and the maximum adsorption capacity could be reached as high as 438.2 mg g −1 . Simultaneously, the PS‐CH 2 ‐[TSiIm][Cl] exhibited excellent removal performance toward trace SDS at ppb level (0.005 mg L −1 ). Common inorganic ions such as K + , Na + , Ca 2+ , and Cl − had no effect of on the removal of SDS even if their concentrations were 20 000 times higher than that of SDS. And the PS‐CH 2 ‐[TSiIm][Cl] was easy to regenerate without loss in adsorption performance. Additionally, the PS‐CH 2 ‐[TSiIm][Cl] was applied to remove the SDS from environmental water samples. The possible adsorption mechanism was also investigated. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136 , 47981.