Molecularly imprinted polymers-based adsorption and photocatalytic approaches for mitigation of environmentally-hazardous pollutants ─a review

Abstract Accelerated urbanization, rampant industrial expansion, modern agricultural practices, and abandoned release of hazardous contaminants to the environment has led to an ever-increasing concern about water quality. Increasing contamination of water bodies has necessitated the development of novel mitigation methods. Adsorption and photocatalytic approaches are the widely explored methods for treating different toxic pollutants due to their simplicity, ease of operation, availability, cost-effectiveness, and suitability for industrial applications. To date, many studies have applied adsorption and photocatalytic processes using different materials, like activated carbon, nanoparticles, metal-organic frameworks, etc., as sorbents and photocatalysts for pollutants removal. Among these materials, molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) have garnered substantial attention as promising materials for pollutants removal due to structural predictability, excellent recognition specificity, and versatile applicability. These attributes encourage researchers to fabricate different kinds of MIPs-based novel materials to abate hazardous contaminants in environmental matrices. In this review, we highlighted the application of MIPs as versatile materials for the effective removal and degradation of an array of emerging pollutants, including organic dyes, pharmaceuticals, and personal care products, herbicides and pesticides, organic molecules, heavy metals, and industrial compounds/byproducts. We mainly focused on MIPs-based adsorption and photocatalytic approaches to remove various types of water pollutants. The possible interactions between target analytes and MIPs were also discussed. The challenges to MIPs-based pollutant mitigation, along with some proposed solutions, have also been delineated.