Nitrogen-Doped Porous Carbons from Ionic Liquids@MOF: Remarkable Adsorbents for Both Aqueous and Nonaqueous Media

Porous carbons were prepared from a metal–organic framework (MOF, named ZIF-8), with or without modification, via high-temperature pyrolysis. Porous carbons with high nitrogen content were obtained from the calcination of MOF after introducing an ionic liquid (IL) (IL@MOF) via the ship-in-bottle method. The MOF-derived carbons (MDCs) and IL@MOF-derived carbons (IMDCs) were characterized using various techniques and used for liquid-phase adsorptions in both water and hydrocarbon to understand the possible applications in purification of water and fuel, respectively. Adsorptive performances for the removal of organic contaminants, atrazine (ATZ), diuron, and diclofenac, were remarkably enhanced with the modification/conversion of MOFs to MDC and IMDC. For example, in the case of ATZ adsorption, the maximum adsorption capacity of IMDC (Q0 = 208 m2/g) was much higher than that of activated carbon (AC, Q0 = 60 m2/g) and MDC (Q0 = 168 m2/g) and was found to be the highest among the reported results so far. The ...