Preparation and characterization of novel macroporous cellulose beads regenerated from ionic liquid for fast chromatography

Macroporous cellulose beads (MCB) used as anion exchangers were successfully prepared from cellulose solution in ionic liquid by double emulsification followed by cross-linking and modification with diethylaminoethyl. The pore structure and properties of the MCB were investigated and the results were compared with homogeneous cellulose beads (HCB). The MCB in size of about 71 μm is characterized by two sets of pores, i.e., diffusion pores (10–20 nm) and macropores (800–2000 nm), determined by mercury porosimeter. In addition, the bed permeability and effective porosity for BSA of MCB-packed column are 58% and 25% higher than those of HCB-packed column, respectively. The adsorption properties of MCB were evaluated, and compared with HCB and commercial absorbent (Sepharose 6 Fast Flow, CSFF). It is found that the pore diffusivity of BSA in MCB is over 7.9 times higher than HCB, and 6.7 times higher than CSFF, respectively. While the equilibrium adsorption capacity (q_m) of BSA on MCB is obviously lower than that on HCB and CSFF, the dynamic binding capacity (DBC) on MCB at 10% breakthrough reaches 47.7 mg/mL, higher than HCB (40.3 mg/mL) and CSFF (46.2 mg/mL) at flow rate of 360 cm/h. In addition, the MCB-packed column showed better column efficiency over the HCB packed one. Therefore, we demonstrated that the MCB possessed more advantages than other ones, like HCB and CSFF, and was expected as an ideal material for fast chromatography.