Abstract
Polyvinyl chloride) (PVC) has been subjected to numerous chemical modifications which were undertaken in order to improve its properties, the use of PVC in new applications and understanding of PVC-related phenomena. This work describes the chemical modification of PVC by amino groups (benzylamine and diethylenetriamine) through nucleophilic substitution reactions of its chlorine atoms to obtain P-1 polymer. The modified polymer was subsequently reticulated with dichlorodiethyl ether to obtain P-2 polymer. The obtained polymers were characterized using infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), elemental analysis (CHN), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), differential thermal analysis (DTA), and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The modified polymers (P-1 and P-2) were tested for metal ion extraction (cadmium, cobalt, lead, or chromium) using the solid-phase extraction (SPE) method and the inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES) technique. Quantitative adsorption measurements were performed using solutions containing 2 . 10(-4) M of heavy metal ions with pH = 3.5-4.5 at a flow rate of 0.6 dm(3)/min. The new extractants based on modified PVC (P-1 and P-2) were able to remove the negative effects of heavy metals contained in aqueous solutions. For Pb2+, the extraction percentage was 98 % using P-1 and 90.3 % using P-2.